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THE LADY, OR THE TIGER? 


AND OTHER STORIES 


FRANK R. STOCKTON 

II 


library 

OF THE 

SUP.'.COUNCIL, 
SO.’ JURISDICTION. 


NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 
1887 


T^^ 

1 S S 

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Copyright, 1884, by 
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONSc 



JTrankUn 

HAND, AVERY, AND COMPANT| 
BOSTON. 


yirrary of Supr«nne Council 

Aug IQ, 1940 


OOISTTEKTS, 


FAOK 

THE LADY, OR THE TIGER? 1 

THE TRANSFERRED GHOST . 11 

THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE 28 

OUR ARCHERY CLUB 52 

THAT SAME OLD ’COON 74 

HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTER 99 

OUR STORY 115 

MR. TOLMAN 134 

ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS 166 

OUR FIRE-SCREEN 178 

A PIECE OF RED CALICO 187 

EVERY MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER . ... 195 

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LIBRARY 
OF THE 

SUP.’.COUNCtL, 

SO.’.JURISDICTION. 


THE LADY, OR THE TIGER? 


I N the very olden time, there lived a semi-barbaric 
king, whose ideas, though somewhat polished and 
sharpened by the progressiveness of distant Latin 
neighbors, were still large, florid, and untrammelled, 
as became the half of him which was barbaric. He was 
a man of exuberant fancy, and, withal, of an authority 
so irresistible that, at his will, he turned his varied 
fancies into facts. He was greatly given to self- 
communing ; and, when he and himself agreed upon 
any thing, the thing was done. When every member 
of his domestic and political systems moved smoothly in 
its appointed course, his nature was bland and genial ; 
but whenever there was a little hitch, and some of his 
orbs got out of their orbits, he was blander and more 
genial still, for nothing pleased him so much as to 
make the crooked straight, and crush down uneven 
places. 

Among the borrowed notions by which his barbarism 
had become semified was that of the public arena, in 
which, by exhibitions of manly and beastly valor, the 
minds of his subjects were refined and cultured. 

1 


2 


THE LADTy OR THE TIGER f 


But even here the exuberant and barbaric fancy as- 
serted itself. The arena of the king was built, not to 
give the people an opportunity of hearing the rhapso- 
dies of dying gladiators, nor to enable them to view the 
inevitable conclusion of a conflict between religious 
opinions and hungry jaws, but for purposes far better 
adapted to widen and develop the mental energies of 
the people. This vast amphitheatre, with its encircling 
galleries, its mysterious vaults, and its unseen passages, 
was an agent of poetic justice, in which crime was pun- 
ished, or virtue rewarded, by the decrees of an impar- 
tial and incorruptible chance. 

When a subject was accused of a crime of sufficient 
importance to interest the king, public notice was given 
that on an appointed day the fate of the accused per- 
son would be decided in the king’s arena, — a structure 
which well deserved its name ; for, although its form 
and plan were borrowed from afar, its purpose ema- 
nated solely from the brain of this man, who, every 
barleycorn a king, knew no tradition to which he owed 
more allegiance than pleased his fancy, and who in- 
grafted on every adopted form of human thought and 
action the rich growth of his barbaric idealism. 

When all the people had assembled in the galleries, 
and the king, surrounded by his court, sat high up on 
his throne of royal state on one side of the arena, he 
gave a signal, a door beneath him opened, and the 
accused subject stepped out into the amphitheatre. 
Directly opposite him, on the other side of the enclosed 
space, were two doors, exactly alike and side by side. 
It was the duty and the privilege of the person on trial, 


THE LABYy OR TEE TIGER f 


3 


to walk directly to these doors and open one of them. 
He could open either door he pleased : he was subject to 
no guidance or influence but that of the aforementioned 
impartial and incorruptible chance. K he opened the 
one, there came out of it a hungry tiger, the fiercest and 
most cruel that could be procured, which immediately 
sprang upon him, and tore him to pieces, as a punish- 
ment for his guilt. The moment that the case of the 
criminal was thus decided, doleful iron bells were 
clanged, great wails went up from the hired mourners 
posted on the outer rim of the arena, and the vast audi- 
ence, with bowed heads and downcast hearts, wended 
slowly their homeward way, mourning greatly that one 
so young and fair, or so old and respected, should have 
merited so dire a fate. 

But, if the accused person opened the other door, 
there came forth from it a lady, the most suitable to 
his yeare and station that his majesty could select 
among his fair subjects ; and to this lady he was im- 
mediately married, as a reward of his innocence. It 
mattered not that he might already possess a wife and 
family, or that his affections might be engaged upon 
an object of his own selection : the king allowed no 
such subordinate arrangements to interfere with his 
great scheme of retribution and reward. The exercises, 
as in the other instance, took place immediately, and 
in the arena. Another door opened beneath the king, 
and a priest, followed by a band of choristers, and 
dancing maidens blowing joyous airs on golden horns 
and treading an epithalamic measure, advanced to 
where the pair stood, side by side ; and the wedding 


4 


THE LADY, OR THE TIGER f 


was promptly and cheerily solemnized. Then the gay 
brass bells rang forth their merry peals, the people 
shouted glad hurrahs, and the innocent man, preceded 
by children strewing flowers on his path, led his bride 
to his home. 

This was the king’s semi-barbaric method of admin- 
istering justice. Its perfect fairness is obvious. The 
criminal could not know out of which door would come 
the lady : he opened either he pleased, without having 
the slightest idea whether, in the next instant, he was 
to be devoured or married. On some occasions the 
tiger came out of one door, and on some out of the 
other. The decisions of this tribunal were not only 
fair, they were positively determinate : the accused 
person was instantly punished if he found himself 
guilty ; and, if innocent, he was rewarded on the spot, 
whether he liked it or not. There was no escape from 
the judgments of the king’s arena. 

The institution was a very popular one. When the 
people gathered together on one of the great trial 
da3-s, they never knew whether they were to witness a 
bloody slaughter or a hilarious wedding. This element 
of uncertainty lent an interest to the occasion which it 
could not otherwise have attained. Thus, the masses 
were entertained and pleased, and the thinking part of 
the community could bring no charge of unfairness 
against this plan ; for did not the accused person 
have the whole matter in his own hands ? 

This semi-barbaric king had a daughter as blooming 
as his most florid fancies, and with a soul as fervent 
and imperious as his own. As is usual in such cases. 


THE LADY, OR THE TIGER f 


5 


she was the apple of his eye, and was loved by him 
above all humanit3^ Among his courtiers was a young 
man of that fineness of blood and lowness of station 
common to the conventional heroes of romance who 
love royal maidens. This royal maiden was well satis- 
fied with her lover, for he was handsome and brave to a 
degree unsurpassed in all this kingdom ; and she loved 
him with an ardor that had enough of barbarism in it 
to make it exceedingly warm and strong. This love 
aflair moved on happily for many months, until one 
day the king happened to discover its existence. He 
did not hesitate nor waver in regard to his duty in the 
premises. The youth was immediately cast into prison, 
and a day was appointed for his trial in the king’s 
arena. This, of course, was an especially important 
occasion ; and his majesty, as well as all the people, 
was greatly interested in the workings and develop- 
ment of this ti’ial. Never before had such a case 
occurred ; never before had a subject dared to love 
the daughter of a king. In after-years such things 
became commonplace enough ; but then they were, in 
no slight degree, novel and startling. 

The tiger-cages of the kingdom were searched for 
the most savage and relentless beasts, from which the 
fiercest monster might be selected for the arena ; and 
the ranks of maiden youth and beauty throughout the 
land were carefully surveyed by competent judges, in 
order that the young man might have a fitting bride in 
case fate did not determine for him a different destiny. 
Of course, everybody knew that the deed with which 
the accused was charged had been done. He had 


6 


THE LADY, OR THE TIGER f 


loved the princess, and neither he, she, nor any one 
else thought of denying the fact ; but the king would 
not think of allowing any fact of this kind to interfere 
with the workings of the tribunal, in which he took 
such great delight and satisfaction. No matter how 
the affair turned out, the youth would be disposed 
of ; and the king would take an aesthetic pleasure in 
watching the course of events, which would determine 
whether or not the young man had done wrong in 
allowing himself to love the princess. 

The appointed day arrived. From far and near the 
people gathered, and thronged the great galleries of 
the arena ; and crowds, unable to gain admittance, 
massed themselves against its outside walls. The 
king and his court were in their places, opposite the 
twin doors, — those fateful portals, so terrible in their 
similarity. 

All was ready. The signal was given. A door 
beneath the royal party opened, and the lover of the 
princess walked into the arena. Tall, beautiful, fair, 
his appearance was greeted with a low hum of admira- 
tion and anxiety. Half the audience had not known 
so grand a youth had lived among them. No wonder 
the princess loved him ! What a terrible thing for 
him to be there ! 

As the youth advanced into the arena, he turned, as 
the custom was, to bow to the king : but he did not 
think at all of that royal personage ; his eyes were 
fixed upon the princess, who sat to the right of her 
father. Had it not been for the moiety of barbarism 
in her nature, it is probable that lady would not have 


THE LADY, OB THE TIGER f 


7 


been there ; but her intense and fervid soul would not 
allow her to be absent on an occasion in which she 
was so terribly interested. From the moment that the 
decree had gone forth, that her lover should decide his 
fate in the king’s arena, she had thought of nothing, 
night or day, but this great event and the various sub- 
jects connected with it. Possessed of more power, 
influence, and force of character than any one who 
had ever before been interested in such a case, she had 
done what no other person had done, — she had pos- 
sessed herself of the secret of the doors. She knew in 
which of the two rooms, that lay behind those doors, 
stood the cage of the tiger, with its open front, and in 
which waited the lady. Through these thick doors, 
heavily curtained with skins on the inside, it was 
impossible that any noise or suggestion should come 
from within to the person who should approach to 
raise the latch of one of them ; but gold, and the 
power of a woman’s will, had brought the secret to 
the princess. 

And not only did she know in which room stood the 
lady ready to emerge, all blushing and radiant, should 
her door be opened, but she knew who the lady was. 
It was one of the fairest and loveliest of the damsels 
of the court who had been selected as the reward of 
the accused youth, should he be proved innocent of the 
crime of aspiring to one so far above him ; and the 
princess hated her. Often had she seen, or imagined 
that she had seen, this fair creature throwing glances 
of admiration upon the person of her lover, and some- 
times she thought these glances were perceived and 


8 


THE LADY, OB THE TIGEB f 


even returned. Now and then she had seen them talk^ 
ing together ; it was but for a moment or two, but 
much can be said in a brief space ; it may have been 
on most unimportant topics, but how could she know 
that? The girl was lovely, but she had ^ared to raise 
her eyes to the loved one of the princess ; and, with 
all the intensity of the savage blood transmitted to her 
through long lines of wholly barbaric ancestors, she 
hated the woman who blushed and trembled behind 
that silent door. 

When her lover turned and looked at her, and his eye 
met hers as she sat there paler and whiter than any one 
in the vast ocean of anxious faces about her, he saw, 
by that power of quick perception which is given to 
those whose souls are one, that she knew behind which 
door crouched the tiger, and behind which stood the 
lady. He had expected her to know it. He under- 
stood her nature, and his soul was assured that she 
would never rest until she had made plain to herself 
this thing, hidden to all other lookers-on, even to the 
king. The only hope for the youth in which there was 
any element of certainty was based upon the success 
of the princess in discovering this mystery ; and the 
moment he looked upon her, he saw she had succeeded, 
as in his soul he knew she would succeed. 

Then it was that his quick and anxious glance asked 
the question : ‘ ‘ Which ? ” It was as plain to her as 
if he shouted it from where he stood. There was not 
an instant to be lost. The question was asked in a 
flash ; it must be answered in another. 

Her right arm lay on the cushioned parapet before 


THE LADTy OJK THE TIGER f 


9 


her. She raised her hand, and made a slight, quick 
movement toward the right. No one but her lover saw 
her. Every eye but his was fixed on the man in the 
arena. 

He turned, and with a firm and rapid step he walked 
across the empty space. Every heart stopped beating, 
every breath was held, every eye was fixed immovably 
upon that man. Without the slightest hesitation, he 
went to the door on \he right, and opened it. 

Now, the point of the story is this : Did the tiger 
come out of that door, or did the lady ? 

The more we reflect upon this question , the harder it 
is to answer. It involves a study of the human heart 
which leads us through devious mazes of passion, out 
of which it is difficult to find our way. Think of it, 
fair reader, not as if the decision of the question de- 
pended upon yourself, but upon that hot-blooded, semi- 
barbaric princess, her soul at a white heat beneath the 
combined fires of despair and jealousy. She had lost 
him, but who should have him ? 

How o^ten, in her waking hours and in her dreams, 
had she started in wild horror, and covered her face 
with her hands as she thought of her lover opening 
the door on the other side of which waited the cruel 
fangs of the tiger ! 

But how much oftener had she seen him at the other 
door ! How in her grievous reveries had she gnashed 
her teeth, and torn her hair, when she saw his start of 
rapturous delight as he opened the door of the lady ! 
How her soul had burned in agony when she had seen 


10 


THE LADY, OB THE TIGER f 


him rush to meet that woman, with her flushing cheek 
and sparkling eye of triumph ; when she had seen him 
lead her forth, his whole frame kindled with the joy of 
recovered life ; when she had heard the glad shouts 
from the multitude, and the wild ringing of the happy 
bells ; when she had seen the priest, with his joyous 
followers, advance to the couple, and make them man 
and wife before her very eyes ; and when she had seen 
them walk away together upon their path of flowers, fol- 
lowed by the tremendous shouts of the hilarious multi- 
tude, in which her one despairing shriek was lost and 
drowned ! 

Would it not be better for him to die at once, and 
go to wait for her in the blessed regions of semi- 
barbaric futurity? 

And yet, that awful tiger, those shrieks, that blood ! 

Her decision had been indicated in an instant, but 
it had been made after days and nights of anguished 
deliberation. She had known she would be asked, she 
had decided what she would answer, and, without the 
slightest hesitation, she had moved her hand to the 
right. 

The question of her decision is one not to be lightly 
considered, and it is not for me to presume to set my- 
self up as the one person able to answer it. And so I 
leave it with all of you : Which came out of the opened 
door, — the lady, or the tiger ? 


THE TRANSFERRED GHOST, 



IHE country residence of Mr. John Hinckman was 


-L a delightful place to me, for many reasons. It 
was the abode of a genial, though somewhat impulsive, 
hospitality. It had broad, smooth-shaven lawns and 
towering oaks and elms ; there were bosky shades at 
several points, and not far from the house there was a 
little rill spanned by a rustic bridge with the bark on ; 
there were fruits and flowers, pleasant people, chess, 
billiards, rides, walks, and Ashing. These were great 
attractions ; but none of them, nor all of them together, 
would have been suflScient to hold me to the place very 
long. I had been invited for the trout season, but 
should, probably, have flnished my visit early in the 
summer had it not been that upon fair days, when the 
grass was dry, and the sun was not too hot, and there 
was but little wind, there strolled beneath the lofty 
elms, or passed lightly through the bosky shades, the 
form of my Madeline. 

This lady was not, in very truth, my Madeline. She 
had never given herself to me, nor had I, in any way, 
acquired possession of her. But as I considered her 


11 


12 


THE TBANSFEBBED GHOST. 


possession the only sufficient reason for the continu- 
ance of my existence, I called her, in my reveries, 
mine. It may have been that I would not have been 
obliged to confine the use of this possessive pronoun 
to my reveries had I confessed the state of my feelings 
to the lady. 

But this was an unusually difficult thing to do. Not 
only did I dread, as almost aU lovers dread, taking 
the step which would in an instant put an end to that 
delightful season which may be termed the ante-inter- 
rogatory period of love, and which might at the same 
time terminate all intercourse or connection with the 
object of my passion ; but I was, also, dreadfully afraid 
of John Hinckman. This gentleman was a good friend 
of mine, but it would have required a bolder man than 
I was at that time to ask him for the gift of his niece, 
who was the head of his household, and, according to 
his own frequent statement, the main prop of his de- 
clining years. Had Madeline acquiesced in my general 
views on the subject, I might have felt encouraged to 
open the matter to Mr. Hinckman ; but, as I said be- 
fore, I had never asked her whether or not she would 
be mine. I thought of these things at all hours of the 
day and night, particularly the latter. 

I was lying awake one night, in the great bed in my 
spacious chamber, when, by the dim light of the new 
moon, which partially filled the room, I saw John 
Hinckman standing by a large chair near the door. I 
was very much surprised at this for two reasons. In 
the first place, my host had never before come into m3' 
room ; and, in the second place, he had gone from home 


THE TRANSFEBREB GHOST. 


13 


that morning, and had not expected to return for sev- 
eral days. It was for this reason that I had been able 
that evening to sit much later than usual with Made- 
line on the moonlit porch. The figure was certainly 
that of John Hinckman in his ordinary dress, but there 
was a vagueness and indistinctness about it which 
presently assured me that it was a ghost. Had the 
good old man been murdered? and had his spirit come 
to tell me of the deed, and to confide to me the protec- 
tion of his dear ? My heart fluttered at what I 

was about to think, but at this instant the figure spoke. 

“ Do you know,” he said, with a countenance that 
indicated anxiety, “ if Mr. Hinckman will return to- 
night?” 

I thought it well to maintain a calm exterior, and I 
answered, — 

“ We do not expect him.” 

“ I am glad of that,” said he, sinking into the chair 
by which he stood. “During the two years and a half 
that I have inhabited this house, that man has never 
before been away for a single night. You can’t ima- 
gine the relief it gives me.” 

And as he spoke he stretched out his legs, and leaned 
back in the chair. His form became less vague, and 
the colors of his garments more distinct and evident, 
while an expression of gratified relief succeeded to the 
anxiety of his countenance. 

“ Two years and a half ! ” I exclaimed. “ I don’t 
understand you.” 

“It is fully that length of time,” said the ghost, 
“ since I first came here. Mine is not an ordinary 


14 


THE TBANSFERREl) GHOST. 


case. But before I say any thing more about it, let 
me ask you again if you are sure Mr. Hinckman will 
not return to-night.” 

“I am as sure of it as I can be of any thing,” I 
answered. “He left to-day for Bristol, two hundred 
miles away.” 

“Then I will go on,” said the ghost, “ for I am glad 
to have the opportunity of talking to some one who will 
listen to me ; but if John Hinckman should come in 
and catch me here, I should be frightened out of my 
wits.” 

“This is all very strange,” I said, greatly puzzled 
by what I had heard. “Are you the ghost of Mr. 
Hinckman?” 

This was a bold question, but my mind was so full 
of other emotions that there seemed to be no room for 
that of fear. 

“Yes, I am his ghost,” my companion replied, 
“ and yet I have no right to be. And this is what 
makes me so uneasy, and so much afraid of him. It 
is a strange story, and, I truly believe, without prece- 
dent. Two years and a half ago, John Hinckman was 
dangerously ill in this very room. At one time he was 
so far gone that he was really believed to be dead. It 
was in consequence of too preeipitate a report in regard 
to this matter that I was, at that time, appointed to be 
his ghost. Imagine my surprise and horror, sir, when, 
after I had aecepted the position and assumed its re- 
sponsibilities, that old man revived, became convales- 
cent, and eventually regained his usual health. My 
situation was now one of extreme delicacy and embar- 


THE TRANSFEBRED GHOST. 


15 


rassment. I had no power to return to my original 
unembodiment, and I had no right to be the ghost of a 
man who was not dead. I was advised by m^^ friends 
to quietly maintain my position, and was assured that, 
as John Hinckman was an elderly man, it could not be 
long before I could rightfully assume the position for 
which I had been selected. But I tell you, sir,” he 
continued, with animation, ‘‘ the old fellow seems as 
vigorous as ever, and I have no idea how much longer 
this annoying state of things will continue. I spend 
my time trying to get out of that old man’s way. I 
must not leave this house, and he seems to follow me 
everywhere. I tell you, sir, he haunts me.” 

“That is truly a queer state of things,” I remarked. 
“ But why are 3^ afraid of him? He couldn’t hurt 
you.” 

“ Of course he couldn’t,” said the ghost. “But his 
very presence is a shock and terror to me. Imagine, 
sir, how you would feel if my case were yours.” 

I could not imagine such a thing at all. I simply 
shuddered. 

“ And if one must be a wrongful ghost at all,” the 
apparition continued, “ it would be much pleasanter to 
be the ghost of some man other than John Hinckman. 
There is in him an irascibility of temper, accompanied 
by a facility of invective, which is seldom met with. 
And what would happen if he were to see me, and find 
out, as I am sure he would, how long and why I had 
inhabited his house, I can scarcely conceive. I have 
seen him in his bursts of passion ; and, although he 
did not hurt the people he stormed at any more than 


16 


THE TRANSFEBRED GHOST. 


lie would hurt me, they seemed to shrink before 
him.” 

All this I knew to be very true. Had it not been 
for this peculiarity of Mr. Hinckman, I might have 
been more willing to talk to him about his niece. 

“I feel sorry for you,” I said, for I really began 
to have a sympathetic feeling toward this unfortunate 
apparition. “Your case is indeed a hard one. It 
reminds me of those persons who have had doubles, 
and I suppose a man would often be very angry indeed 
when he found that there was another being who was 
personating himself. ’ ’ 

“Oh! the cases are not similar at all,” said the 
ghost. “ A double or doppelganger lives on the earth 
with a man ; and, being exactly like him, he makes all 
sorts of trouble, of course. It is very different with 
me. I am not here to live with Mr. Hinckman. I am 
here to take his place. Now, it would make John 
Hinckman very angry if he knew that. DonH you 
know it would ? ’ ’ 

I assented promptly. 

“ Now that he is away I can be easy for a little 
while,” continued the ghost; “and I am so glad to 
have an opportunity of talking to you. I have fre- 
quently come into your room, and watched you while 
you slept, but did not dare to speak to you for fear 
that if you talked with me Mr. Hinckman would hear 
you, and come into the room to know why you were 
talking to 3’ourself.” 

“ But would he not hear you? ” I asked. 

“Oh, no I ” said the other : “ there are times when 


THE TRANSFEBREB GHOST. 


17 


any one may see me, but no one hears me except the 
person to whom I address myself.” 

“ But why did you wish to speak to me? ” I asked. 

“Because,” replied the ghost, “I like occasionally 
to talk to people, and especially to some one like your- 
self, whose mind is so troubled and perturbed that j^ou 
are not likely to be frightened by a visit from one of 
us. But I particularly wanted to ask 3^ou to do me 
a favor. There is every probability, so far as I can 
see, that John Hinckman will live a long time, and my 
situation is becoming insupportable. My great object 
at present is to get myself transferred, and I think 
that you may, perhaps, be of use to me.” 

“ Transferred ! ” I exclaimed. “ What do you mean 
by that? ” 

“What I mean,” said the other, “is this: Now 
that I have started on my career I have got to be the 
ghost of somebody, and I want to be the ghost of a 
man who is really dead.” 

“ I should think that would be easy enough,” I said. 
“ Opportunities must continually occur.” 

“Not at all! not at all!” said my companion 
quickly. “You have no idea what a rush and press- 
ure there is for situations of this kind. Whenever a 
vacancy occurs, if I may express myself in that way, 
there are crowds of applications for the ghostship.” 

“ I had no idea that such a state of things existed,” 
I said, becoming quite interested in the matter. 
“ There ought to be some regular system, or order of 
precedence, by which you could all take your turns 
like customers in a barber’s shop.” 


18 


THE TBANSFERBED GHOST. 


“Oh dear, that would never do at all!’’ said the 
other. “Some of us would have to wait forever. 
There is always a great rush whenever a good ghost- 
ship offers itself — while, as you know, there are some 
positions that no one would care for. And it was in 
consequence of my being in. too great a hurry on an 
occasion of the kind that I got myself into my present 
disagi’eeable predicament, and I have thought that it 
might be possible that you would help me out of it. 
You might know of a case where an opportunity for a 
ghostship was not generally expected, but which might 
present itself at any moment. If you would give me 
a short notice, I know I could arrange for a transfer.” 

“What do 3"OU mean?” I exclaimed. “Do j^ou 
want me to commit suicide ? Or to undertake a mur- 
der for 3"our benefit? ” 

“Oh, no, no, no!” said the other, with a vapory 
smile. “ I mean nothing of that kind. To be sure, 
there are lovers who are watched with considerable 
interest, such persons having been known, in moments 
of depression, to offer very desirable ghostships ; but 
I did not think of any thing of that kind in connection 
with you. You were the onlj" person I cared to speak 
to, and I hoped that you might give me some informa- 
tion that would be of use ; and, in return, I shall be 
very glad to help you in your love affair.” 

“You seem to know that I have such an affair,” I 
said. 

“Oh, yes!” replied the other, with a little yawn. 
“I could not be here so much as I have been without 
knowing all about that.” 


THE TRANSFEBBED GHOST. 


19 


There was something horrible in the idea of iSIade* 
line and myself having been watched by a ghost, even, 
perhaps, w’hen we wandered together in the most de- 
lightful and bosky places. But, then, this was quite 
an exceptional ghost, and I could not have the objec- 
tions to him which would ordinarily arise in regard to 
beings of his class. 

“I must go now,’’ said the ghost, rising: ‘‘but I 
will see you somewhere to-morrow night. And remem- 
ber — you help me, and I’ll help you.” 

I had doubts the next morning as to the propriety 
of telling Madeline any thing about this interview, and 
soon convinced myself that I must keep silent on the 
subject. If she knew there was a ghost about the 
house, she would probably leave the place instantly. I 
did not mention the matter, and so regulated my de- 
meanor that I am quite sure Madeline never suspected 
what had taken place. For some time I had wished 
that Mr. Hinckman would absent himself, for a day 
at least, from the premises. In such case I thought 
I might more easily nerve myself up to the point of 
speaking to Madeline on the subject of our future col- 
lateral existence ; and, now that the opportunity for 
such speech had really occuiTed, I did not feel ready 
to avail m^^self of it. What would become of me if 
she refused me ? 

I had an idea, however, that the lady thought that, 
if I were going to speak at all, this was the time. She 
must have known that certain sentiments were afloat 
within me, and she was not unreasonable in her wish 
to see the matter settled one way or the other. But I 


20 


TEE TBANSFERRED GHOST. 


did not feel like taking ' a bold step in the dark. If 
she wished me to ask her to give herself to me, she 
ought to offer me some reason to suppose that she 
would make the gift. If I saw no probability of sueh 
generosity, I would prefer that things should remain as 
they were. 

That evening I was sitting with Madeline in the 
moonlit porch. It was nearly ten o’clock, and ever 
since supper-time I had been working myself up to 
the point of making an avowal of my sentiments. I 
had not positively determined to do this, but wished 
gradually to reach the proper point, when, if the pros- 
pect looked bright, I might speak. My companion 
appeared to understand the situation — at least, I im- 
agined that the nearer I came to a proposal the more 
she seemed to expect it. It was certainly a very criti- 
cal and important epoch in my life. If I spoke, I 
should make myself happy or miserable forever ; and 
if I did not speak I had every reason to believe that 
the lady would not give me another chance to do so. 

Sitting thus with Madeline, talking a little, and 
thinking very hard over these momentous matters, I 
looked up and saw the ghost, not a dozen feet away 
from us. He was sitting on the railing of the porch, 
one leg thrown up before him, the other dangling down 
as he leaned against a post. He was behind Madeline, 
but almost in front of me, as I sat facing the lady. 
It was fortunate that Madeline was looking out over 
the landscape, for I must have appeared very much 
startled. The ghost had told me that he would see me 


TBE TRANSFEBRED GHOST. 


21 


some lime this night, but I did not think he would 
make his appearance when I was in the company of 
Madeline. If she should see the spirit of her uncle, I 
could not answer for the consequences. I made ho 
exclamation, but the ghost evidently saw that I was 
troubled. 

“ Don’t be afraid,” he said — “I shall not let her 
see me ; and she cannot hear me speak unless I ad- 
dress myself to her, which I do not intend to do.” 

I suppose I looked grateful. 

“ So you need not ti’ouble yourself about that,” the 
ghost continued ; “ but it seems to me that you are not 
getting along very well with your affair. If I were 
you, I should speak out without waiting any longer. 
You will never have a better chance. You are not 
likely to be interrupted ; and, so far as I can judge, 
the lady seems disposed to listen to you favorably ; 
that is, if she ever intends to do so. There is no 
knowing when John Hinckman will go away again ; 
certainly not this summer. If I were in your place, I 
should never dare to make love to Hinckman’s niece if 
he were anywhere about the place. If he should catch 
any one offering himself to Miss Madeline, he would 
then be a terrible man to encounter.” 

I agreed perfectly to all this. 

“I cannot bear to think of him!” I ejaculated 
aloud. 

“ Think of whom? ” asked Madeline, turning quick- 
ly toward me. 

Here was an awkward situation. The long speech 
of the ghost, to which Madeline paid no attention, but 


22 


THE TBANSFERBED GHOST. 


which I heard with perfect distinctness, had made me 
forget myself. 

It was necessary to explain quickly. Of course, it 
would not do to admit that it was of her dear uncle 
that I was speaking ; and so I mentioned hastily the 
first name I thought of. 

“Mr. Vilars,” I said. 

This statement was entirely correct ; for I never 
could bear to think of Mr. Vilars, who was a gentle- 
man who had, at various times, paid much attention to 
Madeline. 

“ It is wrong for you to speak in that way of Mr. 
Vilars,” she said. “He is a remarkably well edu- 
cated and sensible young man, and has very pleasant 
manners. He expects to be elected to the legislature 
this fall, and I should not be surprised if he made his 
mark. He will do well in a legislative body, for when- 
ever Mr. Vilars has any thing to say he knows just 
how and when to say it.” 

This was spoken very quietly, and without any 
show of resentment, which was all very natural, for if 
Madeline thought at all favorably of me she could not 
feel displeased that I should have disagreeable emo- 
tions in regard to a possible rival. The concluding 
words contained a hint which I was not slow to under- 
stand. I felt very sure that if Mr. Vilars were in my 
present position he would speak quickly enough. 

“I know it is wrong to have such ideas about a 
person,” I said, “ but I cannot help it.” 

The lady did not chide me, and after this she seemed 
even in a softer mood. As for me, I felt considerably 


THE TRANSFERRED GHOST. 


23 


annoyed, for I had not wished to admit that any 
thought of Mr. Vilars had ever occupied my mind. 

“You should not speak aloud that way,” said the 
ghost, “ or you may get yourself into trouble. I want 
to see every thing go well with you, because then you 
may be disposed to help me, especially if I should 
chance to be of any assistance to you, which I hope I 
shall be.” 

I longed to tell him that there was no way in which 
he could help me so much as by taking his instant de- 
parture. To make love to a young lady with a ghost 
sitting on the railing near by, and that ghost the appa- 
rition of a much-di*eaded uncle, the very idea of whom 
in such a position and at such a time made me tremble, 
was a difficult, if not an impossible, thing to do ; but 
I forbore to speak, although I may have looked my 
mind. 

“I suppose,” continued the ghost, “that you have 
not heard any thing that might be of advantage to me. 
Of course, I am very anxious to hear ; but if you have 
any thing to tell me, I can wait until you are alone. I 
will come to you to-night in your room, or I will stay 
here until the lady goes away.” 

“You need not wait here,” I said ; “ I have nothing 
at all to say to you.” 

Madeline sprang to her feet, her face flushed and 
her eyes ablaze. 

“Wait here ! ” she cried. “ What do j^ou suppose 
I am waiting for ? Nothing to say to me indeed ! — I 
should think so ! What should you have to say to 
me?” 


24 


THE TBANSFEBBEB GHOST. 


“Madeline,” I exclaimed, stepping toward her, 
“ let me explain.” 

But she had gone. 

Here was the end of the world for me ! I turned 
fiercely to the ghost. 

“Wretched existence!” I cried. “You have 
ruined every thing. You have blackened my whole 
life. Had it not been for you ” 

But here my voice faltered. I could say no more. 

“You wrong me,” said the ghost. “I have not 
injured you. I have tried only to encourage and 
assist you, and it is your own folly that has done 
this mischief. But do not despair. Such mistakes 
as these can be explained. Keep up a brave heart. 
Good-by.” 

And he vanished from the railing like a bursting 
soap-bubble. 

I went gloomily to bed, but I saw no apparitions 
that night except those of despair and misery which 
my wretched thoughts called up. The words I had 
uttered had sounded to Madeline like the basest insult. 
Of course, there was only one interpretation she could 
put upon them. 

As to explaining my ejaculations, that was impos- 
sible. I thought the matter over and over again as I 
lay awake that night, and I determined that I would 
never tell Madeline the facts of the case. It would be 
better for me to suffer all my life than for her to know 
that the ghost of her uncle haunted the house. Mr. 
Hinckman was away, and if she knew of his ghost she 
could not be made to believe that he was not dead. 


TBE TEANSFERUEB GBOST. 


25 


She might not survive the shock! No, my heart 
could bleed, but I would never tell her. 

The next day was fine, neither too cool nor too 
warm ; the breezes were gentle, and nature smiled. 
But there were no walks or rides with Madeline. She 
seemed to be much engaged during the day, and I saw 
but little of her. When we met at meals she was 
polite, but very quiet and reserved. She had evidently 
determined on a course of conduct, and had resolved 
to assume that, although I had been very rude to her, 
she did not understand the import of my words. It 
would be quite proper, of course, for her not to know 
what I meant by my expressions of the night before. 

I was downcast and wretched, and said but little, 
and the only bright streak across the black horizon of 
my woe was the fact that she did not appear to be 
happy, although she affected an air of unconcern. The 
moonlit porch was deserted that evening, but wander- 
ing about the house I found Madeline in the library 
alone. She was reading, but I went in and sat down 
near her. I felt that, although I could not do so fully, 
I must in a measure explain my conduct of the night 
before. She listened quietly to a somewhat labored 
apology I made for the words I had used. 

‘‘I have not the slightest idea what you meant,” 
she said, “ but you were very rude.” 

I earnestly disclaimed any intention of rudeness, 
and assured her, with a warmth of speech that must 
have made some impression upon her, that rudeness 
to her would be an action impossible to me. I said a 
great deal upon the subject, and implored her to be- 


26 


THE TEANSFEBBEH GHOST. 


lieve that if it were not for a certain obstacle I could 
speak to her so plainly that she would understand 
every thing. 

She was silent for a time, and then she said, rather 
more kindly, I thought, than she had spoken before : 

“ Is that obstacle in any way connected with my 
uncle? 

“Yes,” I answered, after a little hesitation, “ it is, 
in a measure, connected with him.” 

She made no answer to this, and sat looking at her 
book, but not reading. From the expression of her 
face, I thought she was somewhat softened toward me. 
She knew her uncle as well as I did, and she may have 
been thinking that, if he were the obstacle that pre- 
vented my speaking (and there were many ways in 
which he might be that obstacle) , my position would 
be such a hard one that it would excuse some wildness 
of speech and eccentricity of manner. I saw, too, 
that the warmth of my partial explanations had had 
some effect on her, and I began to believe that it might 
be a good thing for me to speak my mind without 
delay. No matter how she should receive my proposi- 
tion, my relations with her could not be worse thau 
they had been the previous night and day, and there 
was something in her face which encouraged me to 
hope that she might forget my foolish exclamations 
of the evening before if I began to tell her my tale of 
love. 

I drew my chair a little nearer to her, and as I did 
so the ghost burst into the room from the door-way 
behind her. I say burst, although no door flew open 


THE TBANSFERBED GHOST. 


27 


and he made no noise. He was wildly excited, and 
waved his arms above his head. The moment I saw 
him, my heart fell within me. With the entrance of 
that impertinent apparition, every hope fled from me. 
I could not speak while he was in the room. 

I must have turned pale ; and I gazed steadfastly at 
the ghost, almost without seeing Madeline, who sat 
between us. 

“Do you know,” he cried, “that John Hinckman 
is coming up the hill ? He will be here in fifteen min- 
utes ; and if you are doing any thing in the way of 
love-making, you had better hurry it up. But this is 
not what I came to tell you. I have glorious news ! 
At last I am transferred ! Not forty minutes ago a 
Russian nobleman was murdered by the Nihilists. 
Nobody ever thought of him in connection with an 
immediate ghostship. My friends instantly applied 
for the situation for me, and obtained my transfer. 
I am off before that horrid Hinckman comes up the 
hill. The moment I reach my new position, I shall put 
off this hated semblance. Good-by. You can’t ima- 
gine how glad I am to be, at last, the real ghost of 
somebody.” 

“Oh!” I cried, rising to my feet, and stretching 
out my arms in utter wretchedness, “I would to 
Heaven you were mine ! ” 

“I am yours,” said Madeline, raising to me her 
tearful eyes. 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 



10 WARD the close of a beautiful afternoon in early 


-L summer I stood on the piazza of the spacious 
country-house which was my home. I had just dined, 
and I gazed with a peculiar comfort and delight upon 
the wide-spreading lawn and the orchards and groves 
beyond ; and then, walking to the other end of the 
piazza, I looked out toward the broad pastures, from 
which a fine drove of cattle were leisurely coming home 
to be milked, and toward the fields of grain, whose 
green was beginning already to be touched with yellow. 
Involuntarily (for, on principle, I was opposed to such 
feelings) a pleasant sense of possession came over me. 
It could not be long before all this would virtually be 


mine. 


About two years before, I had married the niece of 
John Hinckman, the owner of this fine estate. He 
was very old, and could not be expected to survive 
much longer, and had willed the property, without 
reserve, to my wife. This, in brief, was the cause of 
my present sense of prospective possession ; and al- 
though, as I said, I was principled against the volun- 


28 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


29 


tary encouragement of such a sentiment, I could not 
blame myself if the feeling occasionally arose within 
me. I had not married my wife for her uncle’s money. 
Indeed, we had both expected that the marriage would 
result in her being entirely disinherited. His niece 
was John Hinckman’s housekeeper and sole prop and 
comfort, and if she left him for me she expected no 
kindness at his hands. But she had not left him. To 
our surprise, her uncle invited us to live with him, and 
our relations with him became more and more amicable 
and pleasant, and Mr. Hinckman had, of late, fre- 
quently expressed to me his great satisfaction that 
I had proved to be a man after his own heart ; that I 
took an interest in flocks and herds and crops ; that 
I showed a talent for such pursuits ; and that I would 
continue to give, when he was gone, the same care and 
attention to the place which it had been so long his 
greatest pleasure to bestow. He was old and ill now, 
and tired of it all ; and the fact that I had not proved 
to be, as he had formerly supposed me, a mere city 
gentleman, was a great comfort to his declining days. 
We were deeply gi’ieved to think that the old man must 
soon die. We would gladly have kept him with us for 
years ; but, if he must go, it was pleasant to know 
that he and ourselves were so well satisfled with the 
arrangements that had been made. Think me not 
cold and heartless, high-minded reader. For a few 
moments put yourself in my place. 

But had you, at that time, put yourself in my place 
on that pleasant piazza, I do not believe you would 
have cared to stay there long ; for, as I stood gazing 


30 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


over the fields, I felt a touch upon ray shoulder. I 
cannot say that I was actually touched, but I experi- 
enced a feeling which indicated that the individual who 
had apparently touched me would have done so had he 
been able. I instantly turned, and saw, standing be- 
side me, a tall figure in the uniform of a Russian officer. 
I started back, but made no sound. I knew what the 
figure was. It was a spectre — a veritable ghost. 

Some years before this place had been haunted. I 
knew this well, for I had seen the ghost myself. But 
before my marriage the spectre had disappeared, and 
had not been seen since ; and I must admit that m3" 
satisfaction, when thinking of this estate, without 
mortgage or incumbrance, was much increased by the 
thought that even the ghost, who used to haunt the 
house, had now departed. 

But here he was again. Although in different form 
and guise, I knew him. It was the same ghost. 

“ Do 3"ou remember me? ” said the figure. 

“Yes,” I answered : “ I remember 3’ou in the form 
in which you appeared to me some time ago. Although 
3"Our aspect is entirel3" changed, I feel you to be the 
same ghost that I have met before.” 

“ You are right,” said the spectre. “ I am glad to 
see you looking so well, and apparently happy. But 
John Hinckman, I understand, is in a very low state 
of health.” 

“Yes,” I said: “he is veiy old and ill. But I 
hope,” I continued, as a cloud of anxiety began to 
rise within me, “ that his expected decease has no con- 
nection with an3" prospects or plans of youi’ own.” 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE, 


81 


“No,” said the ghost. “I am perfectly satisfied 
with my present position. I am off duty during the 
day ; and the difference in time between this country 
and Russia gives me opportunities of being here in 
your early evening, and of visiting scenes and localities 
which are very familiar and agreeable to me.” 

“ Which fact, perhaps, you had counted upon when 
you first put this uniform on,” I remarked. 

The ghost smiled. 

‘ I must admit, however,” he said, “that I am 
seeking this position for a friend of mine, and I have 
reason to believe that he will obtain it.” 

“Good heavens!” I exclaimed. “Is it possible 
that this house is to be haunted by a ghost as soon as 
the old gentleman expires? Why should this family 
be tormented in such a horrible way ? Everybody who 
dies does not have a ghost walking about his house.” 

“ Oh, no I ” said the spectre. “There ai’e thousands 
of positions of the kind which are never applied for ; 
but the ghostship here is a very desirable one, and 
there are many applicants for it. I think 3W will like 
my friend, if he gets it.” 

“ Like him I ” I groaned. 

The idea was horrible to me. 

The ghost evidently perceived how deeply I was 
affected by what he had said, for there was a compas- 
sionate expression on his countenance. As I looked 
at him an idea struck me. If I were to have any 
ghost at all about the house, I would prefer this one. 
Could there be such things as duplex ghostships? 
Since it was day here when it was night in Russia, 


32 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


why could not this spectre serve in both places? It 
was common enough for a person to fill two situations. 
The notion seemed feasible to me, and I broached it. 

“Thank you,” said the ghost. “But the matter 
cannot be arranged in that way. Night and day are 
not suitably divided between here and Russia ; and, 
besides, it is necessary for the incumbent of this place 
to be on duty at all hoims. You remember that I came 
to you b}’ day as well as at night? ” 

Oh, 3’es ! I remembered that. It was additional!}’ 
unfortunate that the ghostship here should not be one 
of the limited kind. 

“Why is it,” I asked, “that a man’s own spirit 
does not attend to these matters? I always thought 
that was the way the thing was managed.” 

The ghost shook his head. 

“ Consider for a moment,” here plied, “ what chance 
a man’s own spirit, without experience and without 
influence, would have in a crowd of importunate appli- 
cants, versed in all the arts, and baeked by the influ- 
ence necessaiy in such a contest. Of course there are 
cases in which a person becomes his own ghost ; but 
this is because the position is undesirable, and there is 
no competition.” 

“ And this new-comer,” I exclaimed, in much 
trouble, “will he take the form of Mr. Hiuckman? 
If my wife should see such an apparition it would kill 
her.” 

“ The ghost who will haunt this place,” said my 
companion, “will not appear in the form of John 
Hiuckman. I am glad that is so, if it will please you ; 


THE SPEC TEAL MOBTGAGE. 


33 


for 3^ou are the only man with whom I have ever held 
such unrestrained and pleasant intercourse. Good-by.’’ 

And with these words no figure of a Kussian oflScer 
stood before me. 

For some minutes I remained motionless, with down- 
cast eyes, a veiy different man from the one who had 
just gazed out with such delight over the beautiful ^ 
landscape. A shadow, not that of night, had fallen 
over every thing. This fine estate was not to come to 
us clear and unencumbered, as we thought. It was 
to be saddled with a horrible lien, a spectral mortgage. 

Madeline had gone up stairs with Pegram. Pegram 
was our baby. I disliked his appellation with all my 
heart ; but Pegram was a family name on Madeline’s 
side of the house, and she insisted that our babe 
should bear it. Madeline was very much wrapped up 
in Pegram, often I thought too much so ; for there 
were man^" times when I should have been veiy glad 
of my wife’s society, but was obliged to do without it 
because she was entirely occupied with Pegram. To 
be sure, m3* wife’s sister was with us, and there was 
a child’s nurse ; but, for all that, Madeline was so 
completely Pegramized, that a great many of the hours 
which I, in my anticipations of matrimonial felicity, 
had imagined would be passed in the company of my ^ 
wife, were spent alone, or with the old gentleman, or 
BeUe. 

Belle was a fine girl ; to me not so charming and 
attractive as her sister, but perhaps equally so to some 
other persons, certainly to one. This was Will Cren- 
shaw, an old school-fellow of mine, then a civil engi- 

library 

OF THE 

SUP.'.COUNCIL, 

SO.'JURISDICTION. 


34 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


neer, in South America. Will was the declared suitor 
of Belle, although she had never formally accepted 
him ; but Madeline and myself both strongly favored 
the match, and felt very anxious that she should do 
so, and indeed were quite certain that when Will 
should return every thing would be made all right. 
The young engineer was a capital fellow, had excellent 
prospects, and was my best friend. It was our plan 
that after their marriage the youthful couple should 
live with us. This, of course, would be delightful to 
both Belle and her sister, and I could desire no better 
companion than Will. He was not to go to distant 
countries any more, and who could imagine a pleas- 
anter home than ours would be. 

And now here was this dreadful prospect of a 
household ghost ! 

A week or so passed by, and John Hinckman was 
no more. Every thing was done for him that respect 
and affection could dictate, and no one mourned his 
death more heartily than I. If I could have had my 
way he would have lived as long as I, myself, remained 
upon this earth. 

When ever}’ thing about the house had settled down 
into its accustomed quiet, I began to look out for the 
coming of the expected ghost. I felt sure that I 
would be the one to whom he would make his appear- 
ance, and with my regret and annoyance at his ex- 
pected coming was mingled a feeling of curiosity to 
know in what form he would appear. He was not to 
come as John Hinckman — that was the only bit of 
comfort in the whole affair. 


THE SPECTBAL MOBTGAGE. 


35 


But several weeks passed, and I saw no ghost ; and 
I began to think that perhaps the aversion I had shown 
to having such an inmate of my household had had its 
effect, and I was to be spared the infliction. And now 
another subject occupied my thoughts. It was sum- 
mer, the afternoons were pleasant, and on one of them 
I asked Belle to take a walk with me. I would have 
preferred Madeline, but she had excused herself as she 
was very busy making what I presumed to be an altar 
cloth for Pegram. It turned out to be an afghan for 
his baby carriage, but the effect was the same : she 
could not go.. When I could not have Madeline I 
liked very well to walk with Belle. She was a pleas- 
ant girl, and in these walks I alwa3’s talked to her of 
Crenshaw. My desire that she should marry my 
friend grew stronger daily. But this afternoon Belle 
hesitated, and looked a little confused. 

“ I am not sure that I shall walk to-day.*’ 

“ But you have your hat on,” I urged : I supposed 
you had made ready for a walk.” 

“No,” said she : “ I thought I would go somewhere 
with my book.” 

“You haven’t a book,” I said, looking at her hands, 
one of which held a parasol. 

“You are dreadfully exact,” she replied, with a 
little laugh : “ I am going into the library to get one.” 
And away she ran. 

There was something about this I did not like. I 
firmly believed she had come down stairs prepared to 
take a walk. But she did not want me ; that was evi- 
dent enough. I went off for a long walk, and when 


36 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


I returned supper was ready, but Belle had not ap- 
peared. 

“ She has gone off somewhere with a book,” I said. 
‘‘I’ll go and look for her.” 

I walked down to the bosky grove at the foot of the 
lawn, and passed through it without seeing any signs 
of Belle. Soon, however, I caught sight of her light 
dress in an open space a little distance beyond me. 
Stepping forward a few paces I had a full view of her, 
and my astonishment can be imagined when I saw that 
she was standing in the shade of a tree talking to a 
young man. His back was turned toward me, but I 
could see from his figure and general air that he was 
young. His hat was a little on one side, in his hand 
he carried a short whip, and he wore a pair of riding- 
boots. He and Belle were engaged in very earnest 
conversation, and did not perceive me. I was not 
onl}^ surprised but shocked at the sight. I was quite 
certain Belle had come here to meet this young man, 
who, to me, was a total stranger. I did not wish Belle 
to know that I had seen her with him ; and so I stepped 
back out of their sight, and began to call her. It was 
not long before I saw her coming toward me, and, as 
I expected, alone. 

“ Indeed,” she cried, looking at her watch, “ I did 
not know it was so late.” 

“ Have you had a pleasant time with your book?” 
I asked, as we walked homeward. 

“ I wasn’t reading all the time,” she answered. 

I asked her no more questions. It was not for me 
to begin an inquisition into this matter. But that 


THE SPECTBAL MORTGAGE. 


37 


night I told Madeline all about it. The news troubled 
her much, and like myself she was greatly grieved at 
Beliefs evident desire to deceive us. When there was 
a necessity for it my wife could completely de-Pegram- 
ize herself, and enter with quick and judicious action 
into the affairs of others. 

“ I will go with her to-morrow,” she said. “ If this 
person comes, I do not intend that she shall meet him 
alone.” 

The next afternoon Belle started out again with her 
book ; but she had gone but a few steps when she was 
joined by Madeline, with hat and parasol, and together 
they walked into the bosky grove. They returned in 
very good time for supper ; and as we went in to that 
meal, Madeline whispered to me : 

“ There was nobody there.” 

“ And did she say nothing to you of the young man 
with whom she was talking yesterday?” I asked, 
when we were alone some hours later. 

“ Not a word,” she said, “ though I gave her every 
opportunity. I wonder if you could have been mis- 
taken.” 

“ I am sure I was not,” I replied. “ I saw the man 
as plainly as I see you.” 

“Then Belle is treating us very badly,” she said. 
“ If she desires the company of young men let her say 
so, and we will invite them to the house.” 

I did not altogether agree with this latter remark. I 
did not care to have Belle know young men. I wanted 
her to marry Will Crenshaw, and be done with it. 
But we both agreed not to speak to the young lady on 


38 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


the subject. It was not for us to pry into her secrets, 
and if an}^ thing was to be said she should say it. 

Every afternoon Belle went away, as before, with 
her book ; but we did not accompany her, nor allude to 
her newly acquired love for solitary walks and studies. 
One afternoon we had callers, and she could not go. 
That night, after I had gone to sleep, Madeline awoke 
me with a little shake. 

“ Listen,” she whispered. “ Whom is Belle talking 
to?” 

The night was warm, and aU our doors and windows 
were open. Belle’s chamber was not far from ours ; 
and we could distinctly hear her speaking in a low 
tone. She was evidently holding a conversation with 
some one whose voice we could not hear. 

“I’ll go in,” said Madeline, rising, “ and see about 
this.” 

“No, no,” I whispered. “She is talking to some 
one outside. Let me go down and speak to him.” 

I slipped on some clothes and stole quietly down the 
stairs. I unfastened the back door and went round to 
the side on which Belle’s window opened. No sooner 
had I reached the corner than I saw, directly under 
the window, and looking upward, his hat cocked a 
good deal on one side, and his riding-whip in his hand, 
the jaunty young fellow with whom I had seen Belle 
talking. 

“ Hello ! ” I cried, and rushed toward him. At the 
sound of my voice he turned to me, and I saw' his face 
distinctly. He was young and handsome. There was 
a sort of half laugh on his countenance, as if he had 


THE 8PECTBAL MOBTGAGE. 


39 


just been saying something very witty. But he did 
not wait to finish his remark or to speak to me. There 
was a large evergreen near him ; and, stepping quickly 
behind it, he was lost to my view. I ran around the 
bush, but could see nothing of him. There was a good 
deal of shrubbery hereabouts, and he was easily able 
to get away unobserved. I continued the search for 
about ten minutes, and then, quite sure that the fellow 
had got away, I returned to the house. Madeline had 
lighted a lamp, and was calling down-stairs to ask if 
I had found the man ; some of the servants were up, 
and anxious to know what had happened ; Pegram was 
crying ; but in Belle’s room all was quiet. Madeline 
looked in at the open door, and saw her lying quietly 
in her bed. No word was spoken ; and my wife 
returned to our room, where we discussed the affair 
for a long time. 

In the morning I determined to give Belle a chance 
to speak, and at the breakfast-table I said to her ; 

“ I suppose you heard the disturbance last night? ” 

“Yes,” she said quietly. “Did you catch the 
man? ” 

“No,” I answered, with considerable irritation, 
“ but I wish I had.” 

“What would you have done if you had caught 
him?” she asked, as with unusual slowness and delib- 
eration she poured some cream upon her oat-meal. 

“ Done ! ” I exclaimed, “ I don’t know what I would 
have done. But one thing is certain, I would have 
made him understand that I would have no strangers 
prowling around my house at night.” 


40 


THE SPECTHAL MORTGAGE. 


Belle colored a little at the last part of this remark ; 
but she made no answer, and the subject was dropped. 

This conversation greatly pained both Madeline and 
myself. It made it quite clear to us that Belle was 
aware that we knew of her acquaintance with this 
young man, and that she still determined to say noth- 
ing to us, either in the way of confidence or excuse. 
She had treated us badly, and we could not help show- 
ing it. On her side Belle was very quiet, and entirely 
different from the gay girl she had been some time 
before. 

I urged Madeline to go to Belle and speak to her as • 
a sister, but she declined. “ No,” she said : “ I know 
Belle’s spirit, and there would be trouble. If there is 
to be a quarrel I shall not begin it.” 

I was detennined to end this unpleasant feeling, 
which, to me, was almost as bad as a quarrel. If the 
thing were possible I would put an end to the young 
man’s visits. I could never have the same opinion of 
Belle I had had before ; but if this impudent fellow 
could be kept away, and Will Crenshaw should come 
back and attend to his business as an earnest suitor 
ought, all might yet be well. 

And now, strange to say, I began to long for the 
ghost, whose coming had been promised. I had been 
considering what means I should take to keep Belle’s 
clandestine visitor away, and had found the question 
rather a diflQcult one to settle. I could not shoot the 
man, and it would indeed be difiScult to prevent the 
meeting of two young persons over whom I had no 
actual control. But I happened to think that if I could 


THE SPECTBAL MOBTGAGE. 


41 


get the aid of the expected ghost the matter would be 
easy. If it should be as accommodating and obliging 
as the one who had haunted the house before, it would 
readily agree to forward the fortunes of the family by 
assisting in breaking up this unfortunate connection. 
If it would consent to be present at their interviews 
the affair was settled. I knew from perso-^al experi- 
ence that love-making in the presence of a ghost was 
extremely unpleasant, and in this case I believed it 
would be impossible. 

Every night, after the rest of the household had 
gone to bed, I wandered about the grounds, examining 
the porches and the balconies, looking up to the chim- 
neys and the ornaments on top of the house, hoping 
to see that phantom, whose coming I had, a short time 
before, anticipated with such dissatisfaction and re- 
pugnance. If I could even again meet the one who 
was now serving in Russia, I thought it would answer 
my purpose as well. 

On the third or fourth night after I had begun my 
nocturnal rounds, I encountered, on a path not very 
far from the house, the young fellow who had given us 
so much trouble. My indignation at his impudent re- 
appearance knew no bounds. The moon was somewhat 
obscured by fleecy clouds ; but I could see that he wore 
the same jaunty air, his hat was cocked a little more 
on one side, he stood with his feet quite wide apart, 
and in his hands, clasped behind him, he held his 
riding- whip. I stepped quickly toward him. 

“ Well, sir ! I exclaimed. 

He did not seem at all startled. 


42 


THE SPECTBAL MOBTGAGE. 


“ How d’ye do? ” he said, with a little nod. 

“ How dare you, sir,” I cried, “ intrude yourself on 
my premises? This is the second time I have found 
you here, and now I want you to understand that you 
are to get away from here just as fast as 3"ou can ; 
and if you are ever caught again anywhere on this 
estate. I’ll have you treated as a trespasser.” 

“Indeed,” said he, “I would be sorry to put you 
to so much trouble. And now let me say that I have 
tried to keep out of your way, but since you have 
proved so determined to make my acquaintance I 
thought I might come forwaixi and do the sociable.” 

“ None of your impertinence,” I cried. “ What 
brings you here, anyway? ” 

“ Well,” said he, with a little laugh, “ if you want to 
know, I don’t mind telling youl came to see Miss Belle.” 

“ You confounded rascal ! ” I cried, raising my 
heavy stick. “ Get out of my sight, or I will break 
your head ! ” 

“ All right,” said he, “ break away ! ” 

And drawing himself up, he gave his right boot a 
slap with his whip. 

The whip went entirely through both legs ! It was 
the ghost ! 

Utterl}’ astounded I started back, and sat down upon 
a raised flower-bed, against which I had stumbled. I 
had no strength, nor power to speak. I had seen a 
ghost before, but I was entirely overcome by this 
amazing development. 

“And now I suppose you know who I am,” said the 
spectre, approaching, and standing in front of me. 


THE SPECTBAL MOBTGAGE. 


43 


“ The one who was here before told me that your lady 
didn’t fancy ghosts, and that I had better keep out of 
sight of both of you ; but he didn’t say any thing about 
Miss Belle : and by George ! sir, it wouldn’t have mat- 
tered if he had ; for if it hadn’t been for that charming 
young lady I shouldn’t have been here at all. I am 
the ghost of Buck Edwards, who was pretty well known 
in the lower part of this county about seventy years 
ago. I always had a great eye for the ladies, sir, and 
when I got a chance to court one I didn’t miss it. I 
did too much courting, however ; for I roused up a 
jealous fellow, named Buggies, and he shot me in a 
duel early one September morning. Since then I have 
haunted, from time to time, more than a dozen houses 
where there were pretty girls.” 

“ Do you mean to say,” I asked, now finding 
strength, ‘‘that a spirit would care to come back to 
this earth to court a girl? ” 

“Why, what are you thinking of ? ” exclaimed the 
phantom of Buck Edwards. “Do you suppose that 
only old raisers and lovelorn maidens want to come 
back and have a good time ? No, sir ! Every one of 
us, who is worth any thing, comes if he can get a 
chance. By George, sir ! do you know I courted Miss 
Belle’s grandmother? And a couple of gay young 
ones we were too ! Nobody ever knew any thing of 
it, and that made it all the livelier.” 

“Do you intend to stay here and pay attention to 
my sister-in-law?” I asked, anxiously. 

“ Certainly I do,” was the reply. “ Didn’t I say 
that is what I came for? ” 


44 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


‘‘Don’t you see the mischief you will do?” 1 
asked. “ You will probably break off a match be- 
tween her and a most excellent gentleman whom we 
all desii’e ” 

‘ ‘ Break off a match ! ’ ’ exclaimed the ghost of Buck 
Edwards, with a satisfied grin. “ How many matches 
I have broken off ! The last thing I ever did, before I 
went away, was of that sort. She wouldn’t marry the 
gentleman who shot me.” There was evidently no 
conscience to this spectre. 

“And if you do not care for that,” I said, in con- 
siderable anger, “I can tell you that you are causing 
ill-feeling between the young lad}" and the best friends 
she has in the world, which may end very disas- 
trously.” 

“Now, look here, my man,” said the ghost; “if 
you and your wife are really her friends 3’ou wont act 
like fools and make trouble.” 

I made no answer to this remark, but asserted, with 
much warmth, that I intended to tell Miss Belle exactly 
what he was, and so break off the engagement at once. 

“ If you tell her that she’s been walking and talking 
with the ghost of the fellow who courted her grand- 
mother, — I reckon she could find some of my letters 
now among the old lady’s papers if she looked for 
them, — you’d frighten the wits out of her. She’d go 
crazy. I know girls’ natures, sir.” 

“So do I,” I groaned. 

“ Don’t get excited,” he said. “ Let the girl alone, 
and every thing will be comfortable and pleasant. 
Good-night.” 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


45 


I went to bed, but not to sleep. Here was a terrible 
situation. A sister-in-law courted by a ghost ! Was 
ever a man called upon to sustain such a trial ! And I 
must sustain it alone. There was no one with whom 
I could share the secret. 

Several times after this I saw this baleful spectre of 
a young buck of the olden time. He would nod to me 
with a jocular air, but I did not care to speak to him. 
One afternoon I went into the house to look for my 
wife ; and, very naturally, I entered the room where 
Pegram lay in his little bed. The child was asleep, 
and no one was with him. I stood and gazed contem- 
platively upon my son. He was a handsome child, 
and apparently full of noble instincts ; and yet I could 
not help wishing that he were older, or that in some 
way his conditions were such that it should not be 
necessary, figuratively speaking, that his mother should 
continually hover about him. If she could be content 
with a little less of Pegram and a little more of me, 
my anticipations of a matrimonial career would be 
more fully realized. 

As these thoughts were passing through my mind I 
raised my eyes, and on the other side of the little bed- 
stead I saw the wretched ghost of Buck Edwards. 

“ Fine boy,’^ he said. 

My indignation at seeing this impudent existence 
within the most sacred precincts of my house was 
boundless. 

“ You vile interloper ! ’’ I cried. 

At this moment Madeline entered the room. Pale 
and stern, she walked directly to the crib and took up 
the child. Then she turned to me and said ; 


46 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


“ I was standing in the door-way, and saw you look- 
ing at my babe. I heard what you said to him. I 
have suspected it before.” And then, with Pegram in 
her arms, she strode out of the room. 

The ghost had vanished as Madeline entered. Filled 
with rage and bitterness, for my wife had never spoken 
to me in these tones before, I ran down-stairs and 
rushed out of the house. I walked long and far, my 
mind filled with doleful thoughts. When I returned to 
the house, I found a note from my wife. It ran thus : 

“I have gone to aimt Hannah’s with Pegram, and have 
taken Belle. I cannot live with one who considers my child 
a vile interloper.” 

As I sat down in my misery, there was one little 
spark of comfort amid the gloom. She had taken 
Belle. My first impulse was to follow into the city 
and explain every thing ; but I quickly reflected that 
if I did this I must tell her of the ghost, and I felt 
certain that she would never return with Pegram to a 
haunted house. Must I, in order to regain my wife, 
give up this beautiful home ? For two days I racked 
my brains and wandered gloomily about. 

In one of my dreary rambles I encountered the 
ghost. “ What are you doing here? ” I cried. “ Miss 
Belle has gone.” 

“I know that,” the spectre answered, his air ex- 
pressing all his usual impertinence and swagger, “ but 
she’ll come back. When your wife returns, she’s 
bound to bring young Miss.” 

At this, a thought flashed through my mind. If any 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


47 


good would come of it, Belle should never return. 
Whatever else happened, this insolent ghost of a gay 
young buck should have no excuse for haunting my 
house. 

‘‘She will never come back while you are here,*’ 
I cried. 

“ I don’t believe it,” it coolly answered. 

I made no further assertions on the subject. I had 
determined what to do, and it was of no use to be 
angry with a vaporing creature like this. But I might 
as well get some information out of him. 

“ Tell me this,” I asked ; “if, for any reason, you 
should leave this place and throw up your situation, so 
to speak, would you have a successor? ” 

“ You needn’t think I am going,” it said contempt- 
uously. “ None of your little tricks on me. But I’ll 
just tell you, for your satisfaction, that if I should take 
it into my head to cut the place, there would be 
another ghost here in no time.” 

“ What is it,” 1 cried, stamping my foot, “ that 
causes this house to be so haunted by ghosts, when 
there are hundreds and thousands of places where such 
apparitions are never seen? ” 

“ Old fellow,” said the spectre, folding its arms, 
and looking at me with half-shut eyes, “ it isn’t the 
house that draws the ghosts, it is somebody in it ; and 
as long as you are here the place will be haunted. But 
you needn’t mind that. Some houses have rats, some 
have fever-and-ague, and some have ghosts. Au 
revoir.” And I was alone. 

So then the spectral mortgage could never be lifted. 


48 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


With heavy heart and feet I passed through the bosky 
grove to my once happy home. 

I had not been there half an hour when Belle ar- 
rived. She had come by the morning train, and had 
nothing with her but a little hand-bag. I looked at 
her in astonishment. 

“Infatuated girl,” I cried, “could you not stay 
away from here three days ? ’ ’ 

“ I am glad you said that,” she answered, taking a 
seat ; “ for now I think I am right in suspecting what 
was on 3’our mind. I ran away from Madeline to 
see if I could find out what was at the bottom of this 
dreadful trouble between you. She told me what you 
said, and I don’t believe you ever used those words to 
Pegram. And now I want to ask you one question. 
Had I, in any way, any thing to do with this? ” 

“ No,” said I, “ not directly.” And then embold- 
ened by circumstances, I added: “But that secret 
visitor or Mend of yours had much to do with it.” 

“ I thought that might be so,” she answered ; “ and 
now, George, I want to tell you something, I am afraid 
it will shock you very much.” 

“ I have had so much to shock me lately that I can 
stand almost any thing now.” 

“Well then, it is this,” she said. “That person 
whom I saw sometimes, and whom you once found 
under my window, is a ghost.” 

“ Did you know that? ” I cried. “ I knew it was a 
ghost, but did not imagine that you had any suspicion 
of it.” 

“Why, yes,” she answered, “I saw through him 


THE SPECTBAL MORTGAGE. 


49 


almost from the very first. I was a good deal startled, 
and a little frightened when I found it out ; but I soon 
felt that this ghost couldn’t do me any harm, and you 
don’t know how amusing it was. I always had a 
fancy for ghosts, but I never expected to meet with 
one like this.” 

“ And so you knew all the time it wasn’t a real 
man,” I exclaimed, still filled with astonishment at 
what I had heard. 

“ A real man ! ” cried Belle, with considerable con- 
tempt in her tones. “ Do you suppose I would become 
acquainted in that wa}^ with a real man, and let him 
come under my window and talk to me ? I was deter- 
mined not to tell any of you about it ; for I knew you 
wouldn’t approve of it, and would break up the fun 
some way. Now I wish most heartily that I had 
spoken of it.” 

“Yes,” I answered, “it might have saved much 
trouble.” 

“But, oh! George,” she continued, “you’ve no 
idea how funny it was ! Such a ridiculous, self-con- 
ceited, old-fashioned ghost of a beau ! ” 

“Yes,” said I, “when it was alive it courted your 
grandmother.” 

“The impudence!” exclaimed Belle. “And to 
think that it supposed that I imagined it to be a real 
man ! Whj^, one day, when it was talking to me it 
stepped back into a rose-bush ; and it stood there ever 
so long, all mixed up with the roses and leaves.” 

“ And you knew it all the time? ” 

These words were spoken in a hollow voice by some 


50 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


one near us. Turning quickly, we saw the ghost of 
Buck Edwards, but no longer the jaunty spectre we 
had seen before. His hat was on the back of his head, 
his knees were turned inward, his shoulders drooped, 
his head hung, and his arms dangled limp at his sides. 

“ Yes,” said Belle, “ I knew it all the time.” 

The ghost looked at her with a faded, misty eye ; 
and then, instead of vanishing briskly as was his wont, 
he began slowly and irresolutely to disappear. First 
his body faded from view, then his head, leaving his 
hat and boots. These gradually vanished, and the 
last thing we saw of the once Buck Edwards was a 
dissolving view of the tip-end of a limp and di’ooping 
riding-whip. 

“He is gone,” said Belle. “We’ll never see him 
again.” 

“Yes,” said I, “he is gone. I think ^’our dis- 
covery of his real nature has completely broken up 
that proud spiidt. And now, what is to be done about 
Madeline? ” 

“Wasn’t it the ghost you called an interloper?” 
asked Belle. 

“ Certainly it was,” I replied. 

“Well, then, go and tell her so,” said Belle. 

“ About the ghost and all ! ” I exclaimed. 

“ Certainly,” said she. 

And together we went to Madeline, and I told her 
all. I found her with her anger gone, and steeped in 
misery. When I had finished, all Pegramed as she 
was, she plunged into my arms. I pressed my wife 
and child closely to my bosom, and we wept with joy. 


THE SPECTRAL MORTGAGE. 


51 


When Will Crenshaw came home and was told this 
story, he said it didn’t trouble him a bit. 

“ I’m not afraid of a rival like that,” he remarked. 
“ Such a suitor wouldn’t stand a ghost of a chance.” 

“But I can tell you,” said Madeline, “that you had 
better be up and doing on your own account. A girl 
like Belle needn’t be expected to depend on the chance 
of a ghost.” 

Crenshaw heeded her words, and the young couple 
were manied in the fall. The wedding took place in 
the little church near our house. It was a quiet mar- 
riage, and was attended by a strictly family party. 
At the conclusion of the ceremonies I felt, or saw, for 
I am sure I did not hear — a little sigh quite near me. 

I turned, and sitting on the chancel-steps I saw the 
spectre of Buck Edwards. His head was bowed, and 
his hands, holding his hat and riding- whip, rested care- 
lessly on his knees. 

“ Bedad, sir ! ” he exclaimed, “to think of it ! If I 
hadn’t cut up as I did I might have married, and have 
been that girl’s grandfather ! ” 

The idea made me smile. 

“ It can’t be remedied now,” I answered. 

“Such a remark to make at a wedding!” said 
Madeline, giving me a punch with her reproachful 
elbow. 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


HEN an archery club was formed in our village, 



V V I was among the first to join it ; but I should 
not, on this account, claim any extraordinary enthusi- 
asm on the subject of archeiy, for nearly all the ladies 
and gentlemen of the place were also among the first 
to join. 

Few of us, I think, had a correct idea of the popu- 
larity of archery in our midst, until the subject of a 
club was broached. Then we all perceived what a 
strong interest we felt in the study and use of the bow 
and arrow. The club was formed immediately ; and 
our thirty members began to discuss the relative merits 
of lance wood, yew, and greenheart bows, and to sur- 
vey yards and lawns for suitable spots for setting up 
targets for home practice. 

Our weekly meetings, at which we came together to 
show in friendly contest how much our home practice 
had taught us, were held upon the village green, or 
rather upon what had been intended to be the village 
green. This pretty piece of ground, partly in smooth 
lawn, and partly shaded by fine trees, was the property 


62 


OUB ABCHEBY CLUB. 


53 


of a gentleman of the place, who had presented it, 
under certain conditions, to the township. But as the 
township had never fulfilled any of the conditions, and 
had done nothing toward the improvement of the spot, 
further than to make it a grazing-place for local cows 
and goats, the owner had withdrawn his gift, shut out 
the cows and goats by a picket-fence, and having 
locked the gate, had hung up the key in his barn. 
When our club was formed, the green, as it was still 
called, was offered to us for our meetings ; and with 
proper gratitude, we elected its owner to be our presi- 
dent. 

This gentleman was eminentl}^ qualified for the presi- 
dency of an archery club. In the first place, he did 
not shoot : this gave him time and opportunity to 
attend to the shooting of others. He was a tall and 
pleasant man, a little elderly. This “elderliness,” if 
I may so put it, seemed, in his case, to resemble some 
mild disorder, like a gentle rheumatism, which, while 
it prevented him from indulging in all the wild hilari- 
ties of youth, gave him, in compensation, a position, 
as one entitled to a certain consideration, which was 
very agreeable to him. His little disease was chronic, 
it is true, and it was growing upon him ; but it was, 
so far, a pleasant ailment. 

And so, with as much interest in bows, and arrows, 
and targets, and successful shots as any of us, he 
never fitted an aiTOw to a string, nor drew a bow ; but 
he attended every meeting, settling disputed points 
(for he studied all the books on archery) ; encoura- 
ging the disheartened ; holding back the eager ones, 


54 


OUB ABCHERY CLUB. 


who would run to the targets as soon as they had shot, 
regardless of the fact that others were still shooting, 
and that the human body is not arrow-proof ; and 
shedding about him that general aid and comfort which 
emanates from a good fellow, no matter what he may 
say or do. 

There were persons — outsiders — who said that arch- 
ery clubs always selected ladies for their presiding 
officers, but we did not care to be too much bound 
down and trammelled by customs and traditions. 
Another club might not have among its members such 
a genial, elderly gentleman, who owned a village green. 

I soon found myself greatly interested in archery, 
especially when I succeeded in planting an arrow 
somewhere within the periphery of the target ; but I 
never became such an enthusiast in bow-shooting as 
my friend Pep ton. 

If Pepton could have arranged matters to suit him- 
self, he would have been born an archer ; but as this 
did not happen to have been the case, he employed 
every means in his power to rectify what he consid- 
ered this serious error in his construction. He gave 
his whole soul, and the greater part of his spare time, 
to archery ; and as he was a young man of energy, this 
helped him along wonderfully. 

His equipments were perfect: no one could excel 
him in this respect. His bow was snake-wood, backed 
with hickory. He carefully rubbed it down every 
evening with oil and bees- wax, and it took its repose 
in a green baize bag. His arrows were Philip High- 
field’s best ; his strings the finest Plunder’s hemp. 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


55 


He h^d shooting-gloves ; and he had little leathern tips, 
that could be screwed fast on the ends of what he 
called his string-fingers. He had a quiver and a belt ; 
and when equipped for the weekly meetings, he carried 
a fancy-colored wiping- tassel, and a little ebon}’ grease- 
pot, hanging from his belt. He wore, when shooting, 
a polished arm-guard or bracer ; and if he had heard 
of any thing else that an archer should have, he 
straightway would have procured it. 

Pepton was a single man ; and he lived with two 
good old maiden ladies, who took as much care of him 
as if they had been his mothem. And he was such 
a good, kind fellow that he deserved aU the attention 
they gave him. They felt a great interest in his arch- 
ery pursuits, and shared his anxious solicitude in the 
selection of a suitable place to hang his bow. 

“You see,” said he, “a fine bow like this, when 
not in use, should always be in a perfectly dry place.” 

“And when in use, too,” said Miss Martha; “for 
I am sure that you oughtn’t to be standing and shoot- 
ing in any damp spot. There’s no surer way of get- 
tin’ chilled.” 

To which sentiment Miss Maria agi’eed, and sug- 
gested wearing rubber shoes, or having a board to 
stand on, when the club met after a rain. 

Pepton first hung his bow in the hall ; but after he 
had arranged it symmetrically upon two long nails 
(bound with green worsted, lest they should scratch 
the bow through its woollen cover) , he refiected that 
the front door would frequently be open, and that 
damp draughts must often go through the hall. He 


56 


OUR ARCHEBT CLUB. 


was sorry to give up this place for his bow, for it was 
convenient and appropriate ; and for an instant he 
thought that it might remain, if the front door could 
be kept shut, and visitors admitted through a little 
side door, which the family generally used, and which 
was almost as convenient as the other, — except, in- 
deed, on wash-days, when a wet sheet or some article 
of wearing apparel was apt to be hung in front of it. 
But, although wash-day occurred but once a week, 
and although it was comparatively easy, after a little 
practice, to bob under a high-propped sheet, Pepton’s 
heart was too kind to allow his mind to dwell upon 
this plan. So he drew the nails from the wall of the 
hall, and put them up in various places about the 
house. His own room had to be aired a great deal in 
all weathers, and so that would not do at all. The 
wall above the kitchen fire-place would be a good loca- 
tion, for the chimney was nearly always warm ; but 
Pepton could not bring himself to keep his bow in the 
kitchen : there would be nothing aesthetic about such 
a disposition of it ; and, besides, the girl might be 
tempted to string and bend it. The old ladies really 
did not want it in the parlor, for its length and its 
green baize cover would make it an encroaching and 
unbecoming neighbor to the little engravings and the 
big samplers, the picture-frames of acorns and pine- 
cones, the fancifully patterned ornaments of clean 
wheat- straw, and all the quaint adornments which had 
hung upon those walls for so many years. But they 
did not say so. If it had been necessary, to make 
room for the bow, they would have taken down the 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


57 


pencilled profiles of their grandfather, their grand- 
mother, and their father when a little boy, which hung 
in a row over the mantel-piece. 

However, Pepton did not ask this sacrifice. In the 
summer evenings, the parlor windows must be open. 
The dining-room was really very little used in the 
evening, except when Miss Maria had stockings to 
darn ; and then she always sat in that apartment, and 
of course she had the windows open. But Miss Maria 
was very willing to bring her work into the parlor, — 
it was foolish, any way, to have a feeling about darn- 
ing stockings before chance company, — and then the 
dining-room could be kept shut up after tea. So into 
the wall of that neat little room Pepton drove his 
worsted-covered nails, and on them carefully laid his 
bow. And the next day Miss Martha and Miss Maria 
went about the house, and covered the nail-holes he 
had made with bits of wall-paper, carefully snipped 
out to fit the patterns, and pasted on so neatly that no 
one would have suspected they were there. 

One afternoon, as I was passing the old ladies’ 
house, I saw, or thought I saw, two men carrying in a 
coffin. I was struck with alarm. 

“What!” I thought, “can either of those good 
women ? Or, can Pepton ? ’ ’ 

Without a moment’s hesitation, I rushed in behind 
the men. There, at the foot of the stairs, directing 
them, stood Pepton. Then it was not he 1 I seized 
him sympathetically b}" the hand. 

“Which?” I faltered. “Which? Who is 

that coffin for? ” 


58 


OUB ABCHERY CLUB. 


“Coffin!” cried Pepton, “why, dear fellow, 
that is not a coffin. That is my ascham.” 

“ Ascham? ” I exclaimed. What is that? ” 

“ Come and look at it,” he said, when the men had 
set it on end against the wall ; “ it is an upright closet, 
or receptacle for an archer’s armament. Here is a 
place to stand the bow ; here are supports for the 
arrows and quivers ; here are shelves and hooks, on 
which to lay or hang every thing the merry man can 
need. And you see, moreover, that it is lined with 
green plush, and that the door fits tightly, so that it 
can stand anywhere, and there need be no fear of 
draughts or dampness affecting my bow. Isn’t it a 
perfect thing? You ought to get one.” 

I admitted the perfection, but agreed no further. I 
had not the income of my good Pepton. 

Pepton was, indeed, most wonderfully well equipped, 
and yet, little did those dear old ladies think, when 
they carefully dusted and reverentially gazed at the 
bunches of aiTOws, the arm-bracers, the gloves, the 
grease-pots, and all the rest of the paraphernalia of 
archery, as it hung around Pepton ’s room ; or when 
they afterward allowed a particular friend to peep at 
it, all arranged so orderly within the ascham ; or when 
they looked with S3'mpathetic, loving admiration on the 
beautiful polished bow, when it was taken out of its 
bag, — little did they think, I say, that Pepton was 
the very poorest shot in the club. In all the surface 
of the much perforated targets of the club, there was 
scarcely a hole that he could put his hand upon his 
heart and say he made. 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB, 


59 


Indeed, I think it was the truth that Pepton was 
born not to be an archer. There were young fellows 
in the club, who shot with bows that cost no more 
than Pepton ’s tassels, but who could stand up and 
whang arrows into the targets all the afternoon, if 
they could get a chance ; and there were ladies who 
made hits five times out of six ; and there were also 
all the grades of archers common to any club. But 
there was no one but hhnself in Pepton’s grade. He 
stood aloue, and it was never any trouble to add up 
his score. 

And yet he was not discouraged. He practised 
every day except Sundays, and indeed he was the 
only person in the club who practised at night. When 
he told me about this, I was a little sm-prised. 

“Why, it’s easy enough,” said he. “You see, 1 
hung a lantern, with a reflector, before the target, just 
a little to one side. It lighted up the target beauti- 
fully ; and I believe there was a better chance of hitting 
it than by daylight, for the only thing you could see 
was the target, and so your attention was not distract- 
ed. To be sure,” he said, in answer to a question, 
“ it was a good deal of trouble to find the arrows, but 
that I always have. When I get so expert that I can 
put all the arrows 'into the target, there will be no 
trouble of the kind, night or day. However,” he con- 
tinued, “T don’t practise any more by night. The 
other evening I sent an arrow slam-bang into the lan- 
tern, and broke it all to flinders. Borrowed lantern, 
too. Besides, I found it made Miss Martha very 
nervous to have me shooting about the house after 


60 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


dark. She had a friend, who had a little boy, whc 
was hit in the leg by an arrow from a bow, which, she 
says, accidentally went off in the night, of its own 
accord. She is certainly a little mixed in her mind in 
regard to this matter ; but I wished to respect her 
feelings, and so shall not use another lantern.” 

As I have said, there were many good archers among 
the ladies of our club. Some of them, after we had 
been organized for a month or two, made scores that 
few of the gentlemen could excel. But the lady who 
attracted the greatest attention when she shot was 
Miss Rosa. 

When this very pretty young lady stood up before 
the ladies’ target — her left side well advanced, her 
bow firmly held out in her strong left arm, which never 
quivered, her head a little bent to the right, her arrow 
drawn back by three well-gloved fingers to the tip of 
her little ear, her dark eyes steadily fixed upon the 
gold, and her dress — well fitted over her fine and 
vigorous figure — falling in graceful folds about her 
feet, we all stopped shooting to look at her. 

“ There is something statuesque about her,” said 
Pep ton, who ardently admired her, “and yet there 
isn’t. A statue could never equal her unless we knew 
there was a probability of movement in it. And the 
only statues which have that are the Jarley wax- works, 
which she does not resemble in the least. There is 
only one thing that that girl needs to make her a per- 
fect archer, and that is to be able to aim better.” 

This was true. Miss Rosa did need to aim better. 
Her arrows had a curious habit of going on all sides of 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


61 


the target, and it was very seldom that one chanced to 
stick into it. For, if she did make a hit, we all knew 
it was chance and that there was no probability of her 
doing it again. Once she put an arrow right into the 
centre of the gold, — one of the finest shots ever made 
on the ground, — but she didn’t hit the target again 
for two weeks. She was almost as bad a shot as 
Pepton, and that is saying a good deal. 

One evening I was sitting with Pepton on the little 
front porch of the old ladies’ house, where we were 
taking our after-dinner smoke while Miss Martha and 
Miss Maria were washing, with their own white hands, 
the china and glass in which they took so much pride. 
I often used to come over and spend an hour with 
Pepton. He liked to have some one to whom he could 
talk on the subjects which filled his soul, and I liked to 
hear him talk. 

“I tell you,” said he, as he leaned back in his chair, 
with his feet carefully disposed on the railing so that 
they would not injure Miss Maria’s Madeira vine, “ I 
tell jou, sir, that there are two things I crave with all 
my power of craving ; two goals I fain would reach ; 
two diadems I would wear upon my brow. One of 
these is to kill an eagle — or some large bird — with 
a shaft from my good bow. I would then have it 
stuffed and mounted, with the very arrow that killed 
it still sticking in its breast. This trophy of my skill 
I would have fastened against the wall of my room, or 
my hall, and I would feel proud to think that my 
grandchildren could point to that bird — which I 
would carefully bequeath to my descendants — and 


62 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


say, ‘ My grand ’ther shot that bird, and with that 
very arrow.’ Would it not stir your pulses, if you 
could do a thing like that ? ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ I should have to stir them up a good deal before 
I could do it,” I replied. “ It would be a hard thing 
to shoot an eagle with an arrow. If you want a stuffed 
bird to bequeath, you’d better use a rifle.” 

“A rifle! ” exclaimed Pep ton. ‘‘There would be 
no glory in that. There are lots of birds shot with 

rifles, — eagles, hawks, wild geese, tom- tits ” 

“ Oh, no ! ” I interrupted, “ not tom-tits.” 

“Well, perhaps they are too little for a rifle,” said 
he ; “ but what I mean to say is, that I w^ouldn’t care 
at all for an eagle I had shot with a rifle. You couldn’t 
show the ball that killed him. If it were put in prop- 
erly, it would be inside, where it couldn’t be seen. 
No, sir ; it is ever so much more honorable, and far 
more difficult, too, to hit an eagle than to hit a target.” 

“ That is very true,” I answered, “ especially in 
these days, when there are so few eagles and so many 
targets. But what is your other diadem? ” 

“ That,” said Pepton, “is to see Miss Rosa wear 
the badge.” 

“ Indeed ! ” said I ; and from that moment I began 
to understand Pepton ’s hopes in regard to the grand- 
mother of those children who should point to the 
eagle. 

“ Yes, sir,” he continued, “ I should be traly happy 
to see her win the badge. And she ought to win it. 
No one shoots more correctly, and with a better un- 
derstanding of all the rules, than she does. There 


OUB ABCHEBY CLUB. 


63 


must, truly, be something the matter with her aiming. 
I’ve half a mind to coach her a little.” 

I turned aside to see who was coming down the 
road. I would not have had him know I smiled. 

The most objectionable person in our club was O. J. 
Hollingsworth. He was a good enough fellow in him- 
self, but it was as an archer that we objected to him. 
There was, so far as I know, scarcel}' a rule of arch- 
ery that he did not habitually violate. Our president 
and nearly all of us remonstrated with him, and Pepton 
even went to see him on the subject ; but it was all to 
no purpose. With a quiet disregard of other people’s 
ideas about bow-shooting and other people’s opinions 
about himself, he persevered in a style of shooting 
which appeared absolutely absurd to any one who 
knew any thing of the rules and methods of archery. 

I used to like to look at him when his turn came 
around to shoot. He was not such a pleasing object of 
vision as Miss Eosa, but his style was so entirely novel 
, to me that it was interesting. He held the bow hori- 
zontally, instead of perpendicularly, like other archers ; 
and he held it well down — about opposite his waist- 
band. He did not draw his arrow back to his ear, but 
he drew it back to the lower button of his vest. Instead 
of standing upright, with his left side to the target, he 
faced it full, and leaned forward over his arrow, in an 
attitude which reminded me of a Roman soldier about 
to fall upon his sword. When he had seized the nock 
of his arrow between his finger and thumb, he languidly 
glanced at the target, raised his bow a little, and let 
fly. The provoking thing about it was that he nearly 


64 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


always hit. If he had only known how to stand, and 
hold his bow, and draw back his arrow, he would have 
been a very good archer. But, as it was, we could not 
help laughing at him, although our president always 
discountenanced any thing of the kind. 

Our Champion was a tall man, very cool and steady, 
who went to work at archery exactly as if he were paid 
a salary, and intended to earn his money honestly. 
He did the best he could in every way. He generally 
shot with one of the bows owned by the club ; but if 
any one on the ground had a better one, he would 
borrow it. He used to shoot sometimes with Pepton’s 
bow, which he declared to be a most capital one ; but 
as Peptoii was always very nervous when he saw his 
bow in the hands of another than himself, the Cham- 
pion soon ceased to borrow it. 

There were two badges, one of green silk and gold, 
for the ladies, and one of green and red, for the gentle- 
men ; and these were shot for at each weekly meeting. 
AVith the exception of a few times, when the club was. 
first formed, the Champion had always worn the gen- 
tlemen’s badge. Many of us tried hard to win it 
from him ; but we never could succeed — he shot too 
well. 

On the morning of one of our meeting days, the 
Champion told me, as I was going to the city with him, 
that he would not be able to return at his usual hour 
that afternoon. He would be very busy, aud would 
have to wait for the 6.15 train, which would bring him 
home too late for the archery meeting. So he gave 
me the badge, asking me to hand it to the president, 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


65 


that he might bestow it on the successful competitor 
that afternoon. 

We were all rather glad that the Champion was 
obliged to be absent. Here was a chance for some one 
of us to win the badge. It was not, indeed, an oppor- 
tunity for us to win a great deal of honor, for if the 
Champion were to be there, we should have no chance ^ 
at all ; but we were satisfied with this much, having no 
reason — in the present, at least — to expect any thing 
more. 

So we went to the targets with a new zeal, and most 
of us shot better than we had ever shot before. In 
this number was O. J. Hollingsworth. He excelled 
himself, and, what was worse, he excelled all the rest 
of us. He actually made a score of eightj’-five in 
twenty-four shots, which at that time was remarkably 
good shooting, for our club. This was dreadful ! To 
have a fellow, who didn’t know how to shoot, beat us 
all, was too bad. If any visitor who knew any thing 
at all of archery should see that the member who wore 
the champion’s badge was a man who held his bow as 
if he had the stomach-ache, it would ruin our character 
as a club. It was not to be borne. 

Pepton, in particular, felt greatly outraged. We 
had met very promptly that afternoon, and had finished 
our regular shooting much earlier than usual ; and now 
a knot of us were gathered together, talking over this 
unfortunate occurrence. 

“ I don’t intend to stand it,” Pepton suddenly ex- 
claimed. “I feel it as a personal disgrace. I’m 
going to have the Champion here before dark. By the 


66 


OUn ARCHERY CLUB. 


rules, he has a right to shoot until the president de- 
clares it is too late. Some of you fellows stay here, 
and I’ll bring him.” 

* And away he ran, first giving me charge of his pre- 
cious bow. There was no need of his asking us to 
stay. We were bound to see the fun out; and to fill 
up the time our president offered a special prize of a 
handsome bouquet from his gardens, to be shot for by 
the ladies. 

Pepton ran to the railroad station, and telegraphed 
to the Champion. This was his message ; 

“ You are absolutely needed here. If possible, take the 5.30 
train for Ackford. I will drive over for you. Answer.” 

There was no train before the 6.15 by which the 
Champion could come directly to our village ; but 
Ackford, a small town about three miles distant, was 
on another raikoad, on which 'there were frequent after- 
noon trains. 

The Champion answered : 

“ All right. Meet me.” 

Then Pepton rushed to our livery stable, hired a 
horse and buggy, and drove to Ackford. 

A little after half-past six, when several of us were 
beginning to think that Pepton had failed in his plans, 
he drove rapidly into the grounds, making a very short 
turn at the gate, and pulled up his panting horse just 
in time to avoid running over three ladies, who were 
seated on the grass. The Champion was by his side ! 

The latter lost no time in talking or salutations. 
He knew what he had been brought there to do, and 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB, 


67 


he immediately set about trying to do it. He took 
Pepton’s bow, which the latter urged upon him ; he 
stood up, straight and firm on the line, at thirty-five 
yards from the gentlemen’s target; he carefully se- 
lected his arrows, examining the feathers and wiping 
away any bit of soil that might be adhering to the 
points after some one had shot them into the turf ; 
with vigorous arm he drew each arrow to its head ; he 
fixed his eyes and his whole mind on the centre of the 
target ; he shot his twenty-four arrows, handed to him, 
one by one, by Pepton, and he made a score of ninety- 
one. 

The whole club had been scoring the shots, as they 
were made, and when the last arrow plumped into the 
red ring, a cheer arose from every member excepting 
three : the Champion, the president and O. J. Hol- 
lingsworth. But Pepton cheered loudly enough to 
make up these deficiencies. 

“What in the mischief did they cheer him for?’* 
asked Hollingsworth of me. “ They didn’t cheer me, 
when I beat everybody on the gounds, an hour ago. 
And it’s no new thing for him to win the badge ; he 
does it every time.” 

“Well,” said I, frankly, “I think the club, as a 
club, objects to your wearing the badge, because you 
don’t know how to shoot.” 

“ Don’t know how to shoot ! ” he cried. “Why, J 
can hit the target better than any of you. Isn’t that 
what you try to do when you shoot? ” 

“Yes,” said I, “of course that is what we try to 
do. But we try to do it in the proper way.” 


68 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


“ Proper granclmotlier ! ” he exclaimed. “ It don’t 
seem to help you much. The best thing 3’ou fellows 
can do is to learn to shoot m}’ wa}", and then perhaps 
you may be able to hit ofteuer.” 

When the Champion had finished shooting, he went 
home to his dinner, but many of us stood about, talk- 
ing over our great escape. 

‘‘ I feel as if I had done that myself,” said Pepton. 
“I am almost as proud as if I had shot — well, not an 
eagle, but a soaring lark.” 

“ Wh3’, that ought to make you prouder than the 
other,” said I ; “ for a lark, especiallj" when it’s soar- 
ing, must be a good deal harder to hit than an eagle.” 

“That’s so,” said Pepton, reflectively; “but I’ll 
stick to the lark. I’m proud.” 

During the next month our style of archery improved 
*' very much, so much, indeed, that we increased our 
distance, for gentlemen, to forty yards, and that for 
ladies to thirt}", and also had serious thoughts of chal- 
lenging the Ackford club to a match. But as this was 
generall}’ understood to be a crack club, we finally de- 
termined to defer our challenge until the next season. 

I^hen I say we improved, I do not mean all of us. I 
do not mean Miss Rosa. Although her attitudes were 
as fine as ever, and every motion as true to rule as 
ever, she seldom made a hit. Pepton actually did try 
to teach her how to aim ; but the various methods of 
pointing the arrow which he suggested resulted in such 
wild shooting, that the boj's who picked up the arrows 
never dared to stick the points of their noses beyond 
their boarded barricade, during Miss Rosa’s turns ai 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


69 


the target. But she was not discouraged ; and Peptou 
often assured her that if she would keep up a good 
heart, and practise regularly, she would get the badge 
yet. As a rule, Pepton was so honest and truthful 
that a little statement of this kind, especially under 
the circumstances, might be forgiven him. 

One day Pepton came to me and announced that he 
had made a discover}^ 

“ It’s about archery,” he said ; “ and I don’t mind 
telling you, because I know you will not go about tell- 
ing evei-ybody else, and also because I want to see you 
succeed as an archer.” 

“I am very much obliged,” I said ; “ and what is the 
discovery ? ’ ’ 

“It’s this,” he answered. “When you draw your 
bow, bring the nock of your aiTOw” — he was always 
very particular about technical terms — “well up to 
5^our ear. Having done that, don’t bother any more 
about your right hand. It has nothing to do with the 
correct pointing of your arrow, for it must be kept 
close to your right ear, just as if it were screwed there. 
Then with your left hand bring around the bow so that 
your fist — with the arrow-head, which is resting on top 
of it — shall point, as nearly as you can make it, di- 
rectly at the centre of the target. Then let fly, and 
ten to one you’ll make a hit. Now, what do 3^ou think 
of that, for a discovery? I’ve thoroughly tested the 
plan, and it works splendidly.” 

“I think,” said I, “that you have discovered the way 
in which good archers shoot. You have stated the 
correct method of managing a bow and arrow.” 


70 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB 


“ Then you don’t think it’s an original method with 
me? ” 

“ Certainly not,” I answered. 

“ But it’s the correct way? ” 

“ There’s no doubt of that,” said I. 

“Well,” said Pepton, “then I shall make it my 
way.” 

He did so ; and the consequence was that one day, 
when the Champion happened to be away, Pepton won 
the badge. When the result was announced, we were 
all surprised, but none so much so as Pepton himself. 
He had been steadily improving since he had adopted 
a good style of shooting, but he had had no idea that 
he would that day be able to win the badge. 

When om* president pinned the emblem of success 
upon the lapel of his coat, Pepton turned pale, and 
then he flushed. He thanked the president, and w^as 
about to thank the ladies and gentlemen ; but probably 
recoUectiug that we had had nothing to do with it, — 
unless, indeed, we had shot badly on his behalf, — he 
refrained. He said little, but I could see that he was 
very proud and veiy happy. There was but one draw- 
back to his triumph : Miss Rosa was not there. She 
was a very regular attendant, but for some reason she 
was absent on this momentous afternoon. I did not 
say any thing to him on the subject, but I knew he 
felt this absence deeply. 

But this cloud could not wholly overshadow his hap- 
piness. He walked home alone, his face beaming, his 
eyes sparkling, and his good bow under his ami. 

That evening I called on him ; for I thought that. 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


71 


when he had cooled down a little, he would like to 
talk over the affair. But he was not in. Miss Maria 
said that he had gone out as soon as he had finished 
his dinner, which he hurried through in a way which 
would certainly injure his digestion if he kept up the 
practice ; and dinner was late, too, for they waited for 
him ; and the archery meeting lasted a long time to- 
day ; and it really was not right for him to stay out 
after the dew began to fall with only ordinary shoes on, 
for what’s the good of knowing how to shoot a bow 
and arrow, if you’re laid up in your bed with rheuma- 
tism or disease of the lungs ! Good old lady ! She 
would have kept Pepton in a green baize bag, had such 
a thing been possible. 

The next morning, full two hours before church- 
time, Pepton called on me. His face was still beam- 
ing. I could not help smiling. 

“ Your happiness lasts well,” I said. 

“Lasts ! ” he exclaimed. “Why shouldn’t it last ! ” 

“ There’s no reason why it should not — at least for 
a week,” I said. “And even longer, if 3^011 repeat 
your success.” 

I did not feel so much like congratulating Pepton as 
I had on the previous evening. I thought he was 
making too much of his badge-winning. 

“ Look here ! ” said Pepton, seating himself, and 
drawing his chair close to me, “ you are shooting wild 
— very wild indeed. You don’t even see the target. 
Let me tell you something. Last evening I went to 
see ]\riss Rosa. She was delighted at my success. I 
had not expected this. I thought she would be pleased, 


72 . 


OUB ABCHEBY CLUB. 


but not to such a degree. Her congratulations were 
so warm that they set me on fire.” 

“They must have been very warm indeed,” I re- 
marked. 

“‘Miss Rosa,’ said I,” continued Pepton, without 
regarding my inteiTuption, “ ‘ it has been my fondest 
hope to see you wear the badge.’ ‘ But I never could 
get it, you know,’ she said. ‘You have got it,’ I ex- 
claimed. ‘ Take this. I won it for you. Make me 
happy by wearing it.’ ‘ I can’t do that,’ she said. 
‘That is a gentleman’s badge.’ ‘Take it,’ I cried, 
‘ gentleman and all ! ’ 

“ I can’t tell you all that happened after that,” con- 
tinued Pepton. “ You know it wouldn’t do. It is 
enough to say that she wears the badge. And we are 
both her own — the badge and I ! ” 

Now I congratulated him in good earnest. There 
was a reason for it. 

“I don’t care a snap now for shooting an eagle,” 
said Pepton, springing to his feet, and striding up and 
down the fioor. “ Let ’em all fly free for me. I have 
made the most glorious shot that man could make. I 
have hit the gold — hit it fair in the very centre ! And 
what’s more, I’ve knocked it clean out of the target ! 
Nobody else can ever make such a shot. The rest 
of you fellows will have to be content to hit the 
red, the blue, the black, or the white. The gold is 
mine ! ” 

I called on the old ladies, some time after this, and 
found them alone. They were generally alone in the 
evenings now. We talked about Pepton ’s engagement, 


OUR ARCHERY CLUB. 


73 


and I found them resigned. They were sorry to lose 
him, but they wanted him to be happy. 

“We have always known,” said Miss Martha, with 
a little sigh, “ that we must die, and that he must get 
married. But we don’t intend to repine. These things 
will come to people.” And her little sigh Tvas followed 
by a smile, still smaller. 


THAT SAME OLD ’COON. 


were sitting on the store-porch of a small Vir- 



V V ginia village. I was one of the party, and 
Martin Heiskill was the other one. Martin had been 
out fishing, which was an unusual thing for him. 

“Yes, sir,” said he, as he held up the small string 
of fish which he had laid carefully under his chair 
^hen he sat down to light his pipe ; “that’s all I’ve 
got to show for a day’s work. But ’taint often that 
I waste' time that way. I don’t b’lieve in huntin’ fur 
a thing that ye can’t see. If fishes sot on trees, now, 
and ye could shoot at ’em, I’d go out and hunt fishes 
with anj^body. But its mighty triflin’ work to be goih’ 
it blind in a mill-pond.” 

I ventured to state that there were fish that were 
occasionally found on trees. In India, for instance, 
a certain fish climbs trees. 

“A which what’s?” exclaimed Martin, with an 
arrangement of pronouns peculiar to himself. 

“ Oh, 3'es ! ” he said, when I had told him all I knew 
about this bit of natural histoi:y\ “ That’s very likely. 
I reckon they do that up North, where you come from, 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


75 


in some of them towns you was tellin’ me about, where 
there’s so many houses that they tech each other.” 

“That’s all true about the fishes, Martin,” said I, 
wisely making no reference to the houses, for I did 
not want to push his belief too hard ; “ but we’ll drop 
them now.” 

“ Yes,” said he, “ I think we’d better.” 

Martin was a good fellow and no fool ; but he had 
not travelled much, and had no correct ideas of cities, 
nor, indeed, of much of an}^ thing outside of his native 
backwoods. But of those backwoods he knew more 
than any other man I ever met. He liked to talk, but 
he resented tall stories. 

“ Martin,” said I, glad to change the subject, “ do 
you think there’ll be many ’coons about, this fall? ” 

“About as many as common, I reckon,” he an- 
swered. “ What do you want to know fur? ” 

“ I’d like to go out ’coon-hunting,” I said ; “ that’s 
something I have never tried.” 

“Well,” said he, “I don’t s’pose your goin’ will 
make much difference in the number of ’em, but, what’s 
the good uv it? You’d better go ’possum-huntin’. 
You kin eat a ’possum.” 

“ Don't you ever eat ’coons? ” I asked. 

“Eat ’coons!” he exclaimed, with contempt. 
“Why, there isn’t a nigger in this county’d eat a 
’coon. They aint fit to eat.” 

“I should think they’d be as good as ’possums,” 
said I. “ They feed on pretty much the same things, 
don’t they? ” 

“ Well, there aint much difference, that way ; but a 


76 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


’possum’s a mighty different thing from a ’coon, when 
ye come to eat him. A ’possum’s more like a kind o’ 
tree-pig. An’ when he’s cooked, he’s sweeter than 
any suckin’-pig you ever see. But a ’coon’s more like 
a cat. Who’d eat cats? ” 

I was about to relate some city sausage stories, but 
I refrained. 

“To be sure,” continued Martin, “there’s Col. 
Tibbs, who says he’s eat ’coon-meat, and liked it fust- 
rate ; but then ag’in, he says frogs is good to eat, so 
ye see there’s no dependin’ on what people say. Now, 
I know what I’m a-talkin’ about ; ’coons aint fit fur 
human bein’s to eat.” 

‘ What makes you hunt ’em, then? ” I asked. 

“Hunt ’em fur fun,” said the old fellow, striking 
a lucifer match under his chair, to re-light his pipe. 
“ Ef ye talk about vittles, that’s one thing ; an’ ef ye 
talk about fun, that’s another thing. An’ I don’t 
know now whether you’d think it was fun. I kinder 
think you wouldn’t. I reckon it’d seem like pretty 
hard work to 3'ou.” 

“I suppose it would,” I said; “there are many 
things that would be hard work to me, that would be 
nothing but sport to an old hunter like 3^ou.” 

“You’re right, there, sir. You never spoke truer 
than that in your life. There’s no man inside o’ six 
counties that’s hunted more’n I have. I’ve been at 
it ever sence I was a youngster ; an’ I’ve got a lot o’ 
fun out uv it, — more fun than any thing else, fur that 
matter. You see, afore the war, people used to go 
huntin’ more for real sport than they do now. An’ 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


77 


’twa’n’t because there was more game in this country 
then than there is now, fur there wa’n’t, — not half as 
much. There’s more game in Virginny now than 
there’s been any time this fifty years.” 

I expressed my surprise at this statement, and he 
continued : 

“It all stands to reason, plain enough. Ef you 
don’t kill them wild critters off, they’ll jist breed and 
breed, till the whole country gits full uv ’em. An’ 
nobody had no time to hunt ’em durin’ the war, — we 
was busy huntin’ different game then, and sometimes 
we was hunted ourselves ; an’ since then the most uv 
us has had to knuclde down to work, — no time for 
huntin’ when you’ve got to do your own hoein’ and 
ploughin’, — or, at least, a big part uv it. An’ I tell 
ye that back there in the mountains there’s lots o’ deer 
where nobody livin’ about here ever saw ’em before, 
and as fur turkeys, and ’coons, and ’possums, there’s 
more an’ more uv’ em ev’ry year, but as fur beavers, — 
them confounded chills-and-fever rep-tyles, — there’s 
jist millions uv ’em, more or less.” 

“ Do beavers have chills and fever? ” I asked won- 
deringly. 

“ No,” said he, “I wish they did. But they give it 
to folks. There aint nothin’ on earth that’s raised the 
price o’ quinine in this country like them beavers. Ye 
see, they’ve jist had the’r own way now, pretty much 
ever seuce the war broke out, and they’ve gone to 
work and built dams across pretty nigh all the cricks 
we got, and that floods the bottom-lands, uv course, 
and makes ma’shes and swamps, where they used to 


78 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


be fust-rate corn-land. Why, I tell ye, sir, down here 
on Colt’s Creek there’s a beaver-dam a quarter uv a 
mile long, an’ the water’s backed up all over every 
thing. Aint that enough to give a whole county the 
chills? An’ it does it too. Ef the people ’d all go 
and sit on that there dam, they’d shake it down. 
I tell ye, sir, the war give us, in this country, a 
good many things we didn’t want, and among ’em’s 
chills. Before the war, nobody never heard of sich 
things as chills round about hyar. ’Taint on’y the 
beavers, nuther. When ye can’t afford to hire more’n 
three or four niggers to work a big farm, ’taint likely 
ye kin do no ditchin’, and all the branches and the 
ditches in the bottom-lands fills up, an’ a feller’s best 
corn-fields is pretty much all swamp, and his family 
has to live on quinine.” 

“ I should think it would pa}^ well to hunt and trap 
these beavere,” I remarked. 

“Well, so it does, sometimes,” said Martin; “but 
half the people aint got no time. Now it’s different 
with me, because I’m not a-farmin’. An’ then it aint 
everybody that kin git ’em. It takes a kind o’ eddica- 
tion to hunt beaver. But you was a-askin’ about 
’coons.” 

“ Yes,” I said. “ I’d like to go ’coon-hunting.” 

“There’s lots o’ fun in it,” said he, knocking the 
ashes out of his pipe, and putting up his cowhide boots 
on the top of the porch-railing in front of him. 

“ About two or three j^ears afore the war, I went 
out on a ’coon-hunt, which was the liveliest hunt I 
ever see in all my life. I never had sich a good hunt 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


79 


afore, nur never sence. I was a-livin’ over in Pow- 
hattan, and the ’coon was Haskinses ’coon. They 
called him Haskinses ’coon, because he was ’most 
alius seen somewhere on ole Tom Haskinses farm. 
Tom’s dead now, an’ so is the ’coon ; but the farm’s 
thar, an’ I’m here, so ye kin b’lieve this story, jist as 
ef it was printed on paper. It was the most confound- 
edest queer ’coon anybody ever see in all this whole 
world. An’ the queerness was this : it hadn’t no 
stripes to its tail. Now ye needn’t say to me that 
no ’coon was ever that way, fur this ’coon was, an’ that 
settles it. All ’coons has four or five brown stripes 
a-runnin’ roun’ their tails, — all ’cept this one ’coon 
uv Haskinses. An’ what’s more, this was the sava- 
gest ’coon anybody ever did see in this whole world. 
That’s what sot everybody huntin’ him ; fur the sav- 
ager a coon is, an’ the more grit ther’ is in him, the 
more’s the fun when he comes to fight the dogs — fur 
that’s whar the fun comes in. An’ ther’ is ’coons as 
kin lick a whole pack o’ dogs, an’ git off ; and this is 
jist what Haskinses ’coon did, lots o’ times. I b’lieve 
every nigger in the county, an’ pretty much half the 
white men, had been out huntin’ that ’coon, and they’d 
never got him yit. Ye see he was so derned cunnin’ 
an’ gritty, that when 3’e cut his tree down, he’d jist 
go through the dogs like a wasp in a Sunday school, 
an’ git away, as I tell ye. He must a’ had teeth more’n 
an inch long, and he had a might}’ tough bite to him. 
Quick, too, as a black-snake. Well, they never got 
him, no how ; but he was often seed, fur he’d even let 
a feller as hadn’t a gun with him git a look at him in 


80 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


the day-time, which is contrary to the natur’ of a ’coon, 
which keeps dark all daj" an on’y comes out arter dark. 
But this here ’coon o’ Haskinses was different from 
any ’coon anybody ever see in all this w'orld. Some- 
times 3’e’d see him a-settin’ down by a branch, a-dip- 
pin’ his food inter the water eveiy time he took a bite, 
which is the natur’ of a coon ; but if ye put yer hand 
inter yer pocket fur so much as a pocket-pistol, he’d 
skoot afore ye could wink. 

“ Well, I made up my mind I’d go out after Has- 
kinses ’coon, and I got up a huntin’ party. ’Twa’n’t 
no trouble to do that. In them days ye could git up 
a huntin’ party easier than any thing else in this whole 
world. All ye had to do was to let the people know, 
an’ the3^’d be thar, black an’ white. ^Vhy, I tell ^-e, 
sir, they used to go fox-huntin’ a lot in them days, an’ 
there wasn’t half as many foxes as ther’ is now, 
nuther. If a feller woke up bright an’ early, an’ felt 
like fox-huntin’, all he had to do was to git on his 
horse, and take his dogs and his horn, and ride off to 
his nex’ neighbor’s, an’ holler. An’ up’d jump the 
nex’ feller, and git on his horse, and take his dogs, 
and them two’d ride off to the nex’ farm an’ holler, 
an’ keep that up till ther’ was a lot uv ’em, with the’r 
hounds, and awa}’ they’d go, tip-it-ty-crack, after the 
fox an’ the hounds — fur it didn’t take long for them 
dogs to scar’ up a fox. An’ they’d keep it up, too, 
like good fellers. Ther’ was a party uv ’em, once, 
started out of a Friday mornin’, and the’r fox, which 
was a red fox (fur a gra^" fox aint no good fur a long 
run) took ’em clean over into Albemarle, and none uv 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


81 


’em didn’t get back home till arter dark, Saturday. 
That was the way we used to hunt. 

“Well, I got up my party, and we went out arter 
Haskinses ’coon. We started out pretty soon arter 
supper. Ole Tom Haskins himself was along, because, 
uv course, he wanted to see his ’coon killed ; an’ ther’ 
was a lot of other fellers that you wouldn’t know ef I 
was to tell ye the’r names. Ye see, it was ’way down 
at the lower end of the county that I was a-livin’ then. 
An’ ther’ was about a dozen niggers with axes, an’ 
five or six little black boys to carry light-wood. There 
was no less than thirteen dogs, all ’coon-hunters. 

“Ye see, the ’coon-dog is sometimes a hound, an’ 
sometimes he isn’t. It takes a right smart dog to 
hunt a ’coon ; and sometimes ye kin train a dog, thet 
aiut a reg’lar huntin’-dog, to be a fust-rate ’coon-dog, 
pertickerlerly when the fightin’ comes in. To be sure, 
ye want a dog with a good nose to him to f oiler up a 
’coon ; but ye want fellers with good jaws and teeth,' 
and plenty of grit, too. We had thirteen of the best 
’coon-dogs in the whole world, an’ that was enough 
fur any one ’coon, I say ; though Haskinses ’coon was 
a pertickerler kind of a ’coon, as I tell ye. 

“Pretty soon arter we got inter Haskinses oak 
woods, jist back o’ the house, the dogs got on the 
track uv a ’coon, an’ after ’em we all went, as hard as 
we could skoot. Uv course we didn’t know that it 
was Haskinses ’coon we was arter ; but we made up 
our minds, afore we started, thet when we killed a 
’coon and found it wasn’t Haskinses ’coon, we’d jist 
keep on till we d’ld find him. We didn’t ’spect to 


82 THAT SAME OLD "COON. 

have much trouble a-findiu’ him, fur we know’d pretty 
much whar he lived, and we went right thar. Taint 
often anybody hunts fur one pertickerler ’coon ; but 
that w'as the matter this time, as I tell ye.” 

It was evident from the business-like way in which 
Martin Heiskill started into this story, that he wouldn’t 
get home in time to have his fish cooked for supper, 
but that was not my affair. It was not eveiy day that 
the old fellow chose to talk, and I was glad enough to 
have him go on as long as he would. 

“As I tell ye,” continued Martin, looking steadily 
over the toe of one of his boots,' as if taking a long 
aim at some distant turkey, “ we put off, hot and 
heavy, arter that ar ’coon, and hard work it was too. 
The dogs took us down through the very stickeryest 
part of the woods, and then down the holler by the 
edge of Lumley’s mill-pond, — whar no human bein’ 
in this world ever walked or nan afore, I truly b’lieve, 
fur it was the meanest travellin’ groun’ I ever see, — and 
then back inter the woods ag’in. But ’twa’n’t long afore 
we came up to the dogs a-barkin’ and howlin’ around 
a big chestnut-oak about three foot through, an’ we 
knew we had him. That is, ef it wa’n’t Haskinses 
’coon. Ef it was his ’coon, may be we had him, and 
may be we hadn’t. The boys lighted up their light- 
wood torches, and two niggers with axes bent to work 
at the tree. And them as wasn’t choppin’ had as 
much as they could do to keep the dogs back out o’ 
the way o’ the axes. 

“ The dogs they was jist goin’ on as ef they was 
mad, and ole Uncle Pete Williams — he was the one 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


83 


thet was a-holdin’ on to Chink, the big dog — that 
dog’s name was Chinkerpin, an’ he was the best 
’coon-dog in the whole world, I reckon. He was a 
big hound, brown an’ black, an’ he was the on’}^ dog 
in thet pack thet had never had a fight with Haskinses 
’coon. They fetched him over from Cumberland, 
a-purpose for this hunt. AVell, as I tell ye, ole Pete, 
says he, ‘Thar aint no mistook dis time, Mahsr Tom, 
now I tell 3"ou. Dese yar dogs knows well ’nuf dat 
dat ’coon’s Mahsr Tom’s ’coon, an’ de}^ tell Chink too, 
fur he’s a-doin’ de debbil’s own pullin’ dis time.’ An’ 
I reckon Uncle Pete was ’bout right, fur I thought the 
dog ud pull him off his legs afore he got through. 

“Pretty soon the niggers hollered fur to stan’ from 
under, an’ down came the chestnut-oak with the big 
smash, an’ then ev’ry dog an’ man an’ nigger made 
one skoot fur that tree. But they couldn’t see no 
’coon, fur he was in a hole ’bout half way up the 
trunk ; an’ then there was another high ole time keepin’ 
back the dogs till the fellers with axes cut him out. 
It didn’t take long to do that. The tree was a kind o’ 
rotten up thar, and afore I know’d it, out hopped the 
’coon ; and then in less then half a shake, there w^as 
sich a fight as you never see in all this w'orld. 

“At first, it ’peared like it was a blamed mean 
thing to let thirteen dogs fight one ’coon ; but pretty 
soon I thought it w^as a little too bad to have on’y 
thirteen dogs fur sich a fiery savage beast as that there 
’coon was. He jist laid down on his back an’ buzzed 
around like a coffee-mill, an’ wdienever a dog got a 
snap at him, he got the ’coon’s teeth inter him quick 


84 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


as lightnin’. Tber’ was too many dogs in that fight, 
an’ ’twa’n’t long before some uv ’em found that out, 
and got out o’ the muss. An’ it was some o’ the dogs 
thet had the best chance at the ’coon thet left fust. 

“ Afore long, though, old Chink, who’d a been 
a-watchin’ his chance, he got a good grip on that 
’coon, an’ that was the end of him. He jist throw’d 
up his hand. 

“ The minute I seed the fight was over, I rushed in 
an’ grabbed that ’coon, an’ like to got grabbed m3’self, 
too, in doin’ it, ’specially by Chink, who didn’t know 
me. One o’ the bo3^s brought a light-wood torch so’s 
we could see the little beast. 

“Well, ’twa’u’t Haskinses ’coon. He had rings 
round his tail, jist as reg’lar as ef he was the feller 
that set the fashion. So ther’ was more ’coon-hunt- 
in’ to be done that night. But ther’ wa’n’t nobody 
that objected to that, fur we were jist gittin’ inter the 
fun o’ the thing. An’ I made up my mind I wasn’t 
a-goin’ home without the tail off er Haskinses ’coon. 

“I disremember now whether the nex’ thing we 
killed was a ’coon or a ’possum. It’s a long time ago, 
and I’ve been on lots o’ hunts since thet ; but the main 
p’ints o’ this hunt I aint likely to furgit, fur, as I tell 
ye, this was the liveliest ’coon-hunt I ever went out on. 

“ Ef it was a ’possum we got next, ther’ wasn’t 
much fun about it, fur a ’possum’s not a game beast. 
Ther’s no fight in him, though his meat’s better. When 
ye tree a ’possum an’ cut down the tree, an’ cut him 
out uv his hole, ef he’s in one, he jist keels over an’ 
makes b’lieve he’s dead, though that’s jinerally no use 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON. 


85 


at all, fur he’s real dead in a minute, and it’s hardly 
wuth while fur him to take the trouble uv puttin’ on 
the sham. Sometimes a ’possum’ll hang by his tail 
to the limb of a tree, an’ ye kin knock him down with- 
out cuttin’ the tree down. He’s not a game beast, as 
I tell ye. But they aint alius killed on the spot. I’ve 
seed niggers take a long saplin’ an’ make a little split 
in it about the middle of the pole, an’ stick the end of 
a ’possum’s long rat- tail through the split an’ carry 
him home. I’ve seed two niggers carryin’ a pole that 
a-way, one at each end, with two or three ’possums 
a-hangin’ frum it. They take ’em home and fatten 
’em. I hate a ’possum, principally fur his tail. Ef it 
was curled up short an’ had a knot in it, it would be 
more like a pig’s tail, an’ then it would seem as ef the 
thing was meant to eat. But the way they have it, 
it’s like nothing in the whole world but a rat’s tail. 

“ So, as I tell ye, ef thet was a ’possum thet we 
treed nex’, ther’ wasn’t no fight, an’ some of the nig- 
gers got some meat. But after that — I remember it 
was about the middle o’ the night — we got off again, 
this time really arter Haskinses ’coon. I was dead 
sure of it. The dogs went diff’rent, too. They was 
jist full o’ fire an’ blood, an’run ahead like as ef they 
was mad. They know’d they wasn’t on the track of 
no common ’coon, this time. As fur all uv us men, 
black an’ white, we jist got up an’ got arter them dogs, 
an’ some o’ the little fellers got stuck in a swamp, 
down by a branch that runs out o’ Haskinses woods 
into Widder Thorp’s corn-field ; but we didn’t stop 
fur nuthin’, an’ they never ketched up. We kep’ on 


86 


THAT SAME OLD ’COON. 


down that branch an’ through the whole corn-field, an’ 
then the dogs they took us crossways up a hill, whar 
we had to cross two or three gullies, an’ I like to broke 
my neck down one uv ’em, fur I was in sich a blamed 
hurry that I tried to jump across, an’ the bank giv’ way 
on the other side, as I might ’a’ know’d it would, an’ 
down I come, backward. But I landed on two niggers 
at the bottom of the gully, an’ that kinder broke my 
fall, an’ I was up an’ a-goin’ ag’in afore you’d ’a’ 
know’d it. 

“Well, as I tell ye, we jist b’iled up that hill, an’ 
then we struck inter the widder’s woods, which is the 
wust woods in the whole world, I reckon, fur runnin’ 
through arter a pack o’ dogs. The whole place was 
so growed up with chinkerpin-bushes and dog- wood, 
an’ every other kind o’ underbrush that a hog would 
’a’ sp’iled his temper goin’ through thar in the day- 
time ; but we jist r’ared an’ plunged through them 
bushes right on to the tails o’ the dogs ; an’ ef any uv 
us had had good clothes on, they’d ’a’ been tore off 
our backs. But ole clothes won’t tear, an’ we didn’t 
care ef they did. The dogs had a hot scent, an’ I tell 
ye, we was close on to ’em when they got to the critter. 
An’ what d’ye s’pose the critter was? It was a dog- 
arned ’possum in a trap ! 

“ It was a trap sot by ole Uncle Enoch Peters, that 
lived on Widder Thorp’s farm. He’s dead now, but 
I remember him fust-rate. He had an’ ole mother 
over in Cumberland, an’ he was the very oldest man 
in this country, an’ I reckon in the whole world, that 
had a livin’ mother. Well, that there sneakin’ ’pos- 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON. 


87 


sum had gone snifflin’ along through the corn-field, 
an’ up that hill, an’ along the gullies, and through 
that onearthly woods to Uncle Enoch’s trap, an’ we’d 
follered him as ef he’d had a store order fur a bar’l o’ 
fiour tied to his tail. 

‘‘Well, he didn’t last long, for the dogs and the 
niggers, between ’em, tore that trap all to bits ; and 
what become o’ the ’possum I don’t b’lieve anybody 
knowed, ’cept it was ole Chink and two or three uv the 
biggest dogs.” 

I here asked if ’coons were ever caught in traps. 

“ Certainly they is,” said Martin. “ I remember 
the time that ther’ was a good many ’coons caught in 
traps. That was in the ole Henry Clay ’lection times. 
The ’coon, he was the Whig beast. He stood for 
Harry Clay and the hull Whig party. Ther’ never was 
a pole-raisin’, or a barbecue, or a speech meetin’, or a 
torch-light percession, in the whole country, that they 
didn’t want a live ’coon to be sot on a pole or some- 
whar whar the people could look at him an’ be encour- 
aged. But it didn’t do ’em no good. Ole Harry Clay 
he went under, an’ ye couldn’t sell a ’coon for a dime. 

“Well, as I tell ye, this was a ’possum in a trap, 
and we was all pretty mad and pretty tired. We got 
out on the edge o’ the woods as soon as we could, an’ 
thar was a field o’ corn. The corn had been planted 
late and the boys found a lot o’ roastin’ ears, though 
they was purty old, but we didn’t care for that. We 
made a fire, an’ roasted the corn, an’ some o’ the men 
had their ‘ ticklers ’ along, — enough to give us each 
a taste, — an’ we lighted our pipes and sat down to 


88 


THAT SAME OLD ’COON. 


take a rest afore startin’ off ag’in arter Haskinses 
’coon.” 

“ But I thought you said,” I remarked, “ that you 
knew you were after Haskins’ ’coon the last time.” 

“Well, so we did know we was. But sometimes 
you know things as isn’t so. Didn’t ye ever find that 
out? It’s so, anyway, jist as I tell ye,” and then he 
continued his story : 

“As we was a-settin’ aroun’ the fire, a-smokin’ 
away. Uncle Pete Williams — he was the feller that 
had to hang on to the big dog. Chink, as I tell ye — • 
he come an’ he says, ‘ Now, look-a-here, Mahsr Tom, 
an’ de rest ob you all, don’t ye bleab we’d better gib 
up dis yere thing an’ go home?’ Well, none uv us 
thought that, an’ we told him so ; but he kep’ on, an’ 
begun to tell us we’d find ourselves in a heap o’ 
misery, ef we didn’t look out, pretty soon. Says he : 

‘ Now, look-a-here, Mahsr Tom, and you all, you all 
wouldn’t a-ketched me out on this yere hunt ef I ’a’ 
knowed ye was a-gwine to hunt ’possums. ’Taint no 
luck to hunt ’possums : everybody knows dat. De 
debbil gits after a man as will go a-chasin’ ’possums 
wid dogs when he kin cotch ’em a heap mau comforta- 
bler in a trap. ’Taint so much diff’rence ’bout ’coons, 
but the debbil he takes care o’ ’possums. An’ I spect 
de debbel know’d ’bout dis yere hunt, fur de oder 
ebenin’ I was a-goin’ down to de rock-spring, wid a 
gourd to git a drink, and dar on de rock, wid his legs 
a-danglin’ down to de water, sat de debbil hisself 
a-chawin’ green terbacker!’ — ‘Green terbacker?’ says 
I. ‘ Why, Uncle Pete, aint the debbil got no better 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON. 


89 


sense than that?’ — ‘ Now, look-a-here, Mahsr Martin,’ 
says he, ‘ de debhil knows what he’s about, an’ ef green 
terbacker was good fur anybody to chaw he wouldn’t 
chaw it, an’ he says to me, ‘‘ Uncle Pete, been 
a-huntin’ any ’possums?” An’ says I, “No, Mahsr, 
I nebber do dat.” An’ den he look at me awful, fur I 
seed he didn’t furgit nothin’, an’ he was a-sottin’ dar, 
a-shinen as ef he was polished all over wid shoe- 
blackin’, an’ he says, “ Now, look-a-here. Uncle Pete, 
don’t you eber do it ; an’ w’at’s dat about dis yere 
Baptis’ church at de Cross-roads, dat was sot afire? ” 
An’ I tole him dat I didn’t know nuffin ’bout dat — 
not one single word in dis whole world. Den he wink, 
an’ he says, “ Dem bruders in dat church hunt too 
many ’possums. Dey is alius a-huntin’ ’possums, an’ 
dat’s de way dey lose der church. I sot dat church 
afire mesef. D’y’ hear dat. Uncle Pete? ” An’ I was 
glad enough to hear it, too ; for der was bruders in dat 
church dat said Teller Joe an’ me sot it afire, cos we 
wasn’t ’lected trustees, but dey can’t say dat now, fur 
it’s all plain as daylight, an’ ef dey don’t bleab it, I 
kin show ’em de berry gourd I tuk down to de rock- 
spring when I seed de debbil. An’ it don’t do to hunt 
no more ’possums, fur de debbil ’d jist as leab scratch 
de end ob his tail ag’in a white man’s church as ag’iu 
a black man’s church.’ 

“ By this time we was all ready to start ag’in ; an’ 
we know’d that all Uncle Pete wanted was to git home 
ag’in, fur he was lazy, and was sich an ole rascal that 
he was afraid to go back by himself in the dark fur 
fear the real debbil’d gobble him up, an’ so we didn’t 


90 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


pay no ’tention to him, but jist started off ag’in. 
Ther’ is niggers as b’lieve the debbil gits after people 
that hunt ’possums, but Uncle Pete never b’lieved that 
when he was a-goin’ to git the ’possum. Ther’ wasn’t 
no chance fur him this night, but he had to come along 
all the same, as I tell ye. 

“ ’Twa’n’t half an hour arter we started ag’in afore 
we found a ’coon, but ’twa’n’t Haskinses ’coon. We 
was near the crick, when the dogs got arter him, an’ 
inste’d o’ gittin’ up a tree, he run up inter the roots uv 
a big pine thet had been blown down, and was a-lajdn’ 
half in the water. The brush was mighty thick jist 
here ; an’ some uv us thought it was another ’possum, 
an’ we kep’ back most uv the dogs, fur we didn’t want 
’em to caiTy us along that creek-bank arter no ’possum. 
But some o’ the niggers, with two or three dogs, pushed 
through the bushes, and one feller clum up inter the 
roots uv the tree, an’ out jumped Mr. ’Coon. He 
hadn’t no chance to git off any other way than to dim’ 
down some grape-vines that was a-hangin’ from the 
tree inter the water. So he slips down one o’ them, 
an’ as he was a-hangin’ on like a sailor a-goin’ down a 
rope, I got a look at him through the bushes, an’ I see 
plain enough bj" the light- wood torch thet he wa’n’t 
Haskinses ’coon. He had the commonest kinds o’ 
bands on his tail. 

‘‘Well, that thar ’coon he looked like he was about 
the biggest fool uv a coon in this whole world. He 
come down to the water, as ef he thought a dog 
couldn’t swim, an’ ef that’s what he did think he foun’ 
out his mistake as soon as he teched the water, fur thar 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON. 


91 


was a dog ready fur him. An’ then they had it lively, 
an’ the other dogs they jumped in, an’ thar was a purty 
big splashin’ an’ plungin’ an’ bitin’ in that thar creek ; 
an’ I was jist a-goin to push through an’ holler fur the 
other fellers to come an’ see the fun, when that thar 
’coon he got off ! He jist licked them dogs — the 
meanest dogs we had along — an’ put fur the other 
bank, an’ that was the end o’ him. ’Coons is a good 
deal like folks — it don’t pay to call none uv ’em fools 
till ye’re done seein’ what they’re up to. 

“ Well, as I tell ye, we was then nigh the crick ; but 
soon as we lef’ the widder’s woods we struck off from 
it, fur none uv us, ’specially the niggers, wanted to go 
nigh ’Lijah Parker’s. Reckon ye don’t know ’Lijah 
Parker. Well, he lives ’bout three mile from here on 
the crick ; an’ he was then, an’ is now, jist the laziest 
man in the whole world. He had two or three big red 
oaks on his place thet he wanted cut down, but was 
too durned lazy to do it ; an’ he hadn’t no money to hire 
anybody to do it, nuther, an’ he was too stingy to 
spend it ef he’d had it. So he know’d ther’ was a-goin 
to be a ’coon-hunt one night ; an’ the evenin’ before he 
tuk a ’coon his boy’d caught in a ’possum-trap, an’ 
he put a chain aroun’ its body, and pulled it through his 
woods to one of his red oak trees. Then he let the 
’coon climb up a little ways, an’ then he jerked him 
down ag’in, and pulled him over to another tree, and so 
on, till he’d let him run up three big trees. Then his 
boy got a box, an’ they put the ’coon in an’ carried 
him home. Uv course, when the dogs come inter his 
woods — an’ he know’d they was a-goin to do that — 


92 


THAT SAME OLD ’COOH. 


they got on the scent o’ this ’coon ; an’ when they 
got to the fust tree, they thought they’d treed hiin> an’ 
the niggers cut down that red oak in no time. An’ 
then’ when ther’ wa’n’t no ’coon thar, they tracked 
him to the nex’ tree, an’ so on till the whole three trees 
was cut down. We wouldn’t ’a’ found out nuthin’ 
about this ef ’Lijah’s boy hadn’t told on the ole man, 
an’ ye kin jist bet all 3'e’re wuth that ther’ aint a man 
in this county that ’u’d cut one o’ his trees down ag’in. 

“ Well, as I tell ye, we kep’ clear o’ Parker’s place, 
an’ we walked about two mile, an’ then we found we’d 
gone clean around till we’d got inter Haskinses woods 
ag’in. We hadn’t gone further inter the woods than 
ye could pitch a rock afore the dogs got on the track 
uv a ’coon, an’ away we all went arter ’em. Even the 
little fellers that was stuck in the swamp away back 
was with us now, fur they got out an’ was a-pokin’ 
home through the woods. ’Twa’n’t long afore that 
’coon was treed ; an’ when we got up an’ looked at 
the tree, we all felt dead sure it was Haskinses ’coon 
this time an’ no mistake. Fur it was jist the kind 
o’ tree that no ’coon but that ’coon would ever ’a’ 
thought o’climbin’. Mos’ ’coons and ’possums shin it 
up a pretty tall tree, to git as fur away frum the dogs 
as they kin, an’ the tall trees is often puity slim trees 
an’ easy cut down. But this here ’coon o’ Haskinses 
he had more sense than that. He jist skooted up the 
thickest tree he could find. He didn’t care about 
gittin’ up high. He know’d the dogs couldn’t climb 
no tree at all, an’ that no man or boy was a-comin’ 
up after him. So he wanted to give ’em the best job 


THAT SAME OLD 'COON. 


98 


o* choppin he know’d how. Ther’ aint no smarter 
critter than ’coons in this whole world. Dogs aint no 
circumstance to ’em. About four or five year ago, 1 
was a-livin’ with Riley Marsh, over by the Court-house ; 
an’ his wife she had a tame ’coon, an’ this little beast 
was a mighty lot smarter than any human bein’ in the 
house. Sometimes, when he’d come it a little too 
heavy with his tricks, they used to chain him up, but 
he always got loose and come a humpin’ inter the 
house with a bit o’ the chain to his collar. D’ye know 
how a ’coon walks? He never comes straight ahead 
like a Christian, but he humps up his back, an’ he 
twists roun’ his tail, an’ he sticks out his head, crooked 
like, frum under his ha’r, an’ he comes inter a room 
sideways an’ a kind o’ cross, as ef he’d a-wanted ter 
stay out an’ play an’ ye’d made him come in the 
house ter learn his lessons. 

“ Well, as I tell ye, this ’coon broke his chain ev’ry 
time, an’ it was a good thick dog-chain, an’ that puz- 
zled Riley ; but one day he saw the little runt goin’ 
aroun’ an’ aroun’ hoppin’ over his chain ev’ry time, 
till he got an awful big twist on his chain, an’ then it 
was easy enough to strain on it till a link opened. But 
Riley put a swivel on his chain, an’ stopped that fun. 
But they’d let him out purty often ; an’ one day he 
squirmed himself inter the kitchen, an’ thar he see the 
tea-kittle a-settin’ by the fireplace. The lid was off, 
an’ ole ’cooney thought that was jist the kind uv a 
black hole he’d been used to crawlin’ inter afore he 
got tame. So he crawled in an’ curled himself up an’ 
went to sleep. Arter a while, in comes Aunt Hannah 


04 


THAT SAME OLD ’COON. 


to git supper ; an’ she picks up the kittle, an’ findift. 
it heavy, thinks it was full o’ water, an’ puts on the 
lid an’ hung it over the fire. Then she clapped on 
some light- wood to hurry up things. Purty soon that 
kittle begun to warm ; an’ then, all uv a sudden, off 
pops the lid, an’ out shoots Mister ’Coon like a rocket. 
An’ ther’ never was, in all this whole world, sich a 
frightened ole nigger as Aunt Hannah. She thought 
it was the debbil, sure, an’ she giv’ a yell that fetched 
ev’ry man on the place. That ere ’coon had more 
mischief in him than any live thing ye ever see. He’d 
pick pockets, hide ev’ry thing he could find, an’ steal 
eggs. He’d find an egg ef the hen ’u’d sneak off an’ 
lay it at the bottom uv the crick. One Sunday', Riley’s 
wife went to all-day preachin’ at Hornorsville, an’ she 
put six mockin’-birds she was a-raisin’ in one cage ; an’, 
fur fear the coon’ ’u’d git ’em, she hung the cage frum 
a hook in the middle uv the ceilin’ in the chamber. 
She had to git upon a chair to do it. Well, she went 
to preachin’, an’ that ’coon he got inter the house an’ 
eat up ev’ry one o’ them mockin’-birds. Ther’ wasn’t 
no tellin’ ’xactl}^ how he done it ; but we reckoned he 
got up on the high mantel-piece an’ made one big 
jump from thar to the cage, an’ hung on till he put his 
paw through an’ hauled out one bird. Then he dropped 
an’ eat that, an’ made anuther jump, till they was all 
gone. Anyway, he got all the birds, an’ that was the 
last meal he ever eat. 

“ Well, as I tell ye, that ’coon he got inter the thick- 
est tree in the whole woods ; an’ thar he sat a-peepin’ 
at us from a crotch that wasn’t twenty feet frum the 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON. 


95 


ground. Young Charley Ferris he took a burnin’ 
chunk that one o’ the boys had fetched along frum 
the fire, an’ throw’d it up at him, ’at we could all 
see him plain. He was Haskinses ’coon, sure. There 
wasn’t a stripe on his tail. Arter that, the niggers 
jist made them axes swing, I tell ye. They had a big 
job afore ’em ; but they took turns at it, an’ didn’t 
waste no time. An’ the rest uv us we got the dogs 
ready. We wasn’t a-goin’ to let this ’coon off this 
here time. No, sir ! Ther’ was too many dogs, as I 
tell 3"e, an’ we had four or five uv the clumsiest uv ’em 
tuk a little way off, ■with boys to hole ’em ; an’ the 
other dogs an’ the hounds, ’specially old Chink, was 
held ready to tackle the ’coon when the time come. 
An’ we had to be mighty sharp about this, too, fur we 
all saw that that thar ’coon was a-goin’ to put the min- 
ute the tree come down. He wasn’t goin’ to git in a 
hole an’ be cut out. Ther’ didn’t ’pear to be an}" hole, 
an’ he didn’t want none. All he wanted was a good 
thick tree an’ a crotch to set in an’ think. That was 
what he was a-doin’. He was cimjerin’ up some trick 
or other. We all know’d that, but we jist made up 
our minds to be ready fur him ; an’ though, as he was 
Haskinses ’coon, the odds was ag’in us, we was dead 
sure we’d git him this time. 

“ I thought that thar tree never was a cornin’ down ; 
but purty soon it began to crack and lean, and then 
down she come. Ev’ry dog, man, an’ boy, made a 
rush fur that crotch, but ther’ was no coon thar. As 
the tree come down he seed how the land lay ; and 
quicker’ n any light ’in’ in this whole world he jist 


96 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON, 


streaked the other way to the root o’ the tree, giv’ one 
hop over the stump, an’ was off. I seed him do it, 
an’ the dogs see him, but they wasn’t quick enough, 
and couldn’t stop ’emselves — they was goin’ so hard 
fur the crotch. 

“Ye never did see in all yer daj^s sech a mad crowd 
as that thar crowd around that tree, but they didn’t 
stop none to sw’ar. The dogs was arter the ’coon, 
an’ arter him we went too. He put fur the edge of the 
woods, which looked queer, fur a coon never will go 
out into the open if he kin help it ; but the dogs 
was so hot arter him that he couldn’t run fur, and he 
was treed ag’in in less than five minutes. This time 
he was in a tall hick’ry-tree, right on the edge o’ the 
woods ; and it wa’n’t a very thick tree, nuther, so the 
niggers they jist tuk ther’ axes, but afore they could 
make a single crack, ole Haskins he runs at ’em an’ 
pushes ’em away. 

“ ‘ Don’t ye touch that thar tree ! ’ he hollers. ‘ That 
hick’ry marks my line ! ’ An’ sure enough, that was 
the tree with the surveyors’ cuts on it, that marked 
the place where the line took a corner that run atween 
Haskinses farm and Widder Thorp’s. He know’d the 
tree the minute he seed it, an’ so did I, fur I carried 
the chain for the surveyors when they laid off the line ; 
an’ we could all see the cut they’d blazed on it, fur it 
was fresh yit, an’ it was gittin’ to be daylight now, an’ 
we could see things plain. 

“ Well, as I tell ye, ev’ry man uv us jist r’ared and 
snorted, an’ the dogs an’ boys was madder’n the rest 
uv us, but ole Haskins he didn’t give in. He jist 


THAT SAME OLD ’COON. 


97 


walked aroun’ that tree an’ wouldn’t let a nigger touch 
it. He said he wanted to kill the ’coon jist as much 
as anybody, but he wasn’t a-goin to have his line 
sp’iled, arter the money he’d spent, fur all the ’coons 
in this whole world. 

“ Now did ye ever hear of sich a cute trick as that? 
That thar ’coon he must ’a’ knowed that was Haskinses 
line-tree, an’ I spect he’d ’a’ made fur it fust, ef he’d 
a-kuowed ole Haskins was along. But he didn’t know 
it, till he was a-settin’ in the crotch uv the big tree 
and could look aroun’ an’ see who was thar. It 
wouldn’t ’a’ been no use fur him to go for that hick’ry 
if Haskins hadn’t ’a’ bin thar, for he know’d well 
enough it ’u’d ’a’ come down sure.” 

I smiled at this statement, but Martin shook his 
head. 

“ ’Twon’t do,” he said, “ to under vally the sense of 
no ’coon. How’re ye goin to tell what he knows? Well, 
as I tell ye, we was jist gittin’ madder an’ madder 
when a nigger named Wash Webster, he run out in the 
field, — it was purt}’ light now, as I tell ye — an’ he 
hollers, ‘ O, Mahsr Tom ! Mahsr Tom ! Dat ar ’coon 
he aint you ’coon ! He got stripes to he tail ! ’ 

“We all made a rush out inter the field, to try to 
git a look ; an’ sure enough we could see the little 
beast a-settin’ up in a crotch over on that side, an’ I 
do b’lieve he knowed what we was all a-lookin’ up fur, 
fur he jist kind a lowered his tail out o’ the crotch so’s 
we could see it, an’ thar it was, striped, jist like any 
ether coon’s tail.” 

“And you were so positively sure this time, that it 


98 


THAT SAME OLD ^COON. 


was Haskins’ ’coon,” I said. “Why, you saw, when 
the man threw the blazing chunk into the big tree, that 
it had no bands on its tail.” 

“ That’s so,” said Martin ; “ but ther’ aint no man 
that kin see ’xactly straight uv a dark mornin’, with 
no light but a fly in’ chunk, and ’specially when he 
wants to see somethin’ that isn’t thar. An’ as to bein’ 
certain about that ’coon, I jist tell ye that ther’s 
nothin’ a man’s more like to be mistook about, than a 
thing he knows fur dead sure. 

“Well, as I tell ye, when we seed that that thar 
’coon wa’n’t Haskinses ’coon, arter all, an’ that we 
couldn’t git him out er that tree as long as the ole man 
was thar, we jist give up and put across the fleld for 
Haskinses house, whar we was a-goin’ to git break- 
fus’. Some of the boys and the dogs staid aroun’ the 
tree, but ole Haskins he ordered ’em off an’ wouldn’t 
let nobody stay thar, though they had a mighty 
stretchin’ time gittin’ the dogs away.” 

“ It seems to me,” said I, “ that there wasn’t much 
proflt in that hunt.” 

“ Well,” said Martin, putting his pipe in his pocket, 
and feeling under his chair for his string of fish, which 
must have been pretty dry and stiff by this time, “ the 
fun in a ’coon-hunt aint so much in gittin’ the ’coon, as 
goin’ arter him — which is purty much the same in a 
good many other things, as I tell ye.” 

And he took up his fish and departed. 


HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTER. 


I T is now five years since an event occurred which 
so colored my life, or rather so changed some of 
its original colors, that I have thought it well to write 
an account of it, deeming that its lessons may be of 
advantage to persons whose situations in life are simi- 
lar to my own. 

When I was quite a young man I adopted litera- 
ture as a profession ; and having passed through the 
necessary preparatory grades, I found m3'self, after a 
good many years of hard, and often unremunerative 
work, in possession of what might be called a fair 
literary practice. My articles, grave, gay, practical, 
or fanciful, had come to be considered with a favor 
by the editors of the various periodicals for which I 
wrote, on which I found in time I could rely with a 
very comfortable certainty. My productions created 
no enthusiasm in the reading public ; they gave me no 
great reputation or very valuable pecuniary return ; 
but they were always accepted, and my receipts from 
them, at the time to which I have refen’ed, were as 
regular and reliable as a salary, and quite sufiScient 
to give me more than a comfortable support. 


100 HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTEE. 

It was at this time I married. I had been engaged 
for more than a 3’ear, but had not been willing to as- 
sume the support of a wife until I felt that m}^ pecu- 
niary position was so assured that I could do so with 
full satisfaction to my own conscience. There was 
now no doubt in regard to this position, either in my 
mind or in that of my wife. I worked with great 
steadiness and regularity ; I knew exactly where to 
place the productions of my pen, and could calculate, 
with a fair degree of accuracy, the sums I should 
receive for them. We w^ere by no means rich; but 
we had enough, and were thoroughly satisfied and 
content. 

Those of my readers who are marrted will have no 
difficult}" in remembering the peculiar ecstas}" of the 
first weeks of their wedded life. It is then that the 
flowers of this world bloom brightest ; that its sun is 
the most genial ; that its clouds are the scarcest ; that 
its fruit is the most delicious ; that the air is the most 
balmy ; that its cigars are of the highest flavor ; that 
the warmth and radiance of early matrimonial felicity 
so rarefies the intellectual atmosphere, that the soul 
mounts higher, and enjoys a wider prospect, than ever 
before. 

These experiences were mine. The plain claret of 
my mind was changed to sparkling champagne, and 
at the ver}" height of its effervescence I wrote a story. 
The happy thought that then struck me for a tale was 
of a very peculiar character ; and it interested me so 
much that I went to work at it with great delight and 
enthusiasm, and finished it in a comparatively short 


EIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTEB. 101 


time. The title of the story was “His Wife’s De- 
ceased Sister;” and when I read it to Hypatia she 
was delighted with it, and at times was so affected by 
its pathos that her uncontrollable emotion caused a 
sympathetic dimness in my eyes, which prevented my 
seeing the words I had written. When the reading was 
ended, and my wife had dried her eyes, she turned to 
me and said, “This story will make your fortune. 
There has been nothing so pathetic since Lamartine’s 
‘ History of a Servant-Girl.’ ” 

As soon as possible the next day I sent my story 
to the editor of the periodical for which I wrote most 
frequently, and in which my best productions gener- 
ally appeared. In a few days I had a letter from the 
editor, in which he praised my story as he had never 
before praised any thing from my pen. It had inter- 
ested and charmed, he said, not only himself, but all 
his associates in the office. Even old Gibson, who 
never cared to read any thing until it was in proof, 
and who never praised any thing which had not a joke 
in it, was induced by the example of the others to 
read this manuscript, and shed, as he asserted, the 
fii’st tears that had come from his eyes since his 
final paternal castigation some forty years before. 
The story would appear, the editor assured me, as 
soon as he could possibly find room for it. 

If any thing could make our skies more genial, our 
flowers brighter, and the flavor of our fruit and cigars 
more delicious, it was a letter like this. And when, in 
a very short time, the story was published, we found 
that the reading public was inclined to receive it with 


102 HIS WIFE^S DECEASED SISTEB. 

as much sympathetic interest and favor as had been 
shown to it by the editors. My personal friends soon 
began to express enthusiastic opinions upon it. It was 
highly praised in many of the leading newspapers ; 
and, altogether, it was a great literary success. I am 
not inclined to be vain of my writings, and, in general, 
my wife tells me, think too little of them ; but I did 
feel a good deal of pride and satisfaction in the suc- 
cess of “ His Wife’s Deceased Sister.” If it did not 
make my fortune, as my wife asserted that it would, it 
certainly would help me very much in my literary 
career. 

In less than a month from the writing of this story, 
something very unusual and unexpected happened to 
me. A manuscript was returned by the editor of the 
periodical in which “ His Wife’s Deceased Sister ” had 
appeared. “ It is a good story,” he wrote, “but not 
equal to what you have just done. You have made a 
great hit ; and it would not do to interfere with the rep- 
utation you have gained, by publishing any thing infe- 
rior to ‘ His Wife’s Deceased Sister,’ which has had 
such a deserved success.” 

I was so unaccustomed to having my work thrown 
back on my hands, that I think I must have turned a 
little pale when I read the letter. I said nothing of 
the matter to my wife, for it would be foolish to drop 
such grains of sand as this into the smoothlj’’ oded ma- 
chinery of our domestic felicity ; but I uninediatel}’ 
sent the story to another editor. I am not able to ex- 
press the astonishment I felt, when, in the course of a 
week, it was sent back to me. The tone of the note 


HIS WIFE\S DECEASED SISTER. 103 


accompanying it indicated a somewhat injured feeling 
on the part of the editor. “ I am reluctant,” he said, 
• • to decline a manuscript from you ; but you know very 
well that if you sent me any thing like ‘ His AYife’s 
Deceased Sister ' it would be most promptly accepted.” 

I now felt obliged to speak of the affair to my wife, 
who was quite as much surprised, though, perhaps, not 
quite as much shocked, as I had been. 

“ Let us read the story again,” she said, and see 
what is the matter with it.” When we had finished 
its perusal, Hypatia remarked : “ It is quite as good as 
many of the stories you have had printed, and I think 
it very interesting ; although, of course, it is not equal 
to ‘ His Wife’s Deceased Sister.’ ” 

“Of course not,” said I, “that was an inspiration 
that I cannot expect every day. But there must be 
something wrong about this last story which we do not 
perceive. Perhaps my recent success may have made 
me a little careless in writing it.” 

“ I don’t believe that,” said Hypatia. 

“At any rate,” I continued, “I will lay it aside, 
and will go to work on a new one.” 

In due course of time I had another manuscript fin- 
ished, and I sent it to my favorite periodical. It was 
retained some weeks, and then came back to me. “ It 
will never do,” the editor wrote, quite warmly, “ for 
you to go backward. The demand for the number 
containing ‘ His Wife’s Deceased Sister ’ still con- 
tinues, and we do not intend to let you disappoint 
that great body of readers who would be so eager to 
see another number containing one of your stories.” 


104 HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTEB. 

I sent this manuscript to four other periodicals, and 
from each of them was it returned with remarks to the 
effect, that, although it was not a bad story in itself, it 
was not what they would expect from the author of 
“ His Wife’s Deceased Sister.” 

The editor of a Western magazine wrote to me for 
a story to be published in a special number which he 
would issue for the holidays. I wrote him one of the 
character and length he asked for, and sent it to him. 
By return mail it came back to me. “ I had hoped,” 
the editor wrote, “ when I asked for a story from your 
pen, to receive something like ‘ His Wife’s Deceased 
Sister,’ and I must own that I am very much disap- 
pointed.” 

I was so filled with anger when I read this note, that 
I openly objm’gated “ His Wife’s Deceased Sister.” 
“ You must excuse me,” I said to my astonished wife, 
“ for expressing myself thus in your presence ; but 
that confounded story will be the ruin of me yet. 
Until it is forgotten nobody will ever take any thing I 
write.” 

“And you cannot expect it ever to be forgotten,” 
said Hj^patia, with tears in her eyes. 

It is needless for me to detail my literai’y efforts in 
the course of the next few months. The ideas of the 
editors with whom my principal business had been 
done, in regard to my literary ability, had been so 
raised by my unfortunate story of “His Wife’s De- 
ceased Sister,” that I found it was of no use to send 
them any thing of lesser merit. And as to the other 
journals which I tried, they evidently considered it an 


HIS. WIFE’S DECEASED SISTER. 105 


insult for me to send them matter inferior to that by 
which my reputation had lately risen. The fact was 
that my successful story had ruined me. My income 
was at end, and want actually stared me in the face ; 
and I must admit that I did not like the expression 
of its countenance. It was of no use for me to try 
to write another story like “ His Wife’s Deceased 
Sister.” I could not get married every time I began 
a new manuscript, and it was the exaltation of mind 
caused by my wedded felicity which produced that 
story. 

“It’s perfectly dreadful! ” said my wife. “If I 
had had a sister, and she had died, I would have 
thought it was my fault.” 

“ It could not be your fault,” I answered, “ and I 
do not think it was mine. I had no intention of 
deceiving anybody into the belief that I could do 
that sort of thing every time, and it ought not to be 
expected of me. Suppose Eaphael’s patrons had tried 
to keep him screwed up to the pitch of the Sistine 
Madonna, and had refused to buy any thing which 
was not as good as that. In that case I think he 
would have occupied a much earlier and narrower 
grave than that on which Mr. Morris Moore hangs 
his funeral decorations.” 

“But, my dear,” said Hypatia, who was posted on 
such subjects, “ the Sistine Madonna was one of his 
latest paintings.” 

“ Very true,” said I ; “ but if he had married, as I 
did, he would have painted it earlier.” 

I was walking homeward one afternoon about this 


106 HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTEB. 


time, when 1 met Barbel, — a man I had known well 
in my early literaiy career. He was now about fifty 
years of age, but looked older. His hair and beard 
were quite gray ; and his clothes, which were of the 
same general hue, gave me the idea that they, like his 
hair, had originally been black. Age is very hard on 
a man’s external appointments. Barbel had an ah’ 
of having been to let for a long time, and quite out of 
repair. But there was a kindly gleam in his eye, and 
he welcomed me cordially. 

“Why, what is the matter, old fellow?” said he. 
“ I never saw you look so woe-begone.” 

I had no reason to conceal any thing from Barbel. 
In my younger days he had been of great use to me, 
and he had a right to know the state of my affairs. I 
laid the whole case plainly before him. 

“ Look here,” he said, when I had finished, “ come 
with me to my room : I have something I would like 
to say to 3"ou there.” 

I followed Barbel to his room. It was at the top 
of a very dirty and well-worn house, which stood in a 
narrow and lumpy street, into which few vehicles ever 
penetrated, except the ash and garbage carts, and the 
rickety wagons of the venders of stale vegetables. 

“ This is not exactly a fashionable promenade,” said 
Barbel, as we approached the house; “but in some 
respects it reminds me of the streets in Italian towns, 
where the palaces lean over towards each other in such 
a friendly way.” 

Barbel’s room was, to my mind, rather more doleful 
than the street. It w'as dark, it was dusty, and cob- 


HIS WIFE^S DECEASED SISTEB. 107 


webs hung from every corner. The few chairs upon 
the floor and the books upon a greasy table seemed to 
be aflflicted with some dorsal epidemic, for their backs 
were either gone or broken. A little bedstead in the 
corner was covered with a spread made of “ New- 
York Heralds,” with their edges pasted together. 

“ There is nothing better,” said Barbel, noticing my 
glance towards this novel counterpane, “ for - a bed- 
covering than newspapers : they keep you as warm as 
a blanket, and are much lighter. I used to use “ Tri- 
bunes,” but they rattled too much.” 

The only part of the room which was well lighted 
was at one end near the solitary window. Here, upon 
a table with a spliced leg, stood a little grindstone. 

“At the other end of the room,” said Barbel, “is 
my cook-stove, which you can’t see unless I light the 
candle in the bottle which stands by it ; but if you 
don’t care particularly to examine it, I won’t go to the 
expense of lighting up. You might pick up a good 
many odd pieces of bric-a-brac around here, if you 
chose to strike a match and investigate ; but I would 
not advise you to do so. It would pay better to throw 
the things out of the window than to carry them down 
stairs. The particular piece of in-door decoration to 
which I wish to call your attention is this.” And he 
led me to a little wooden frame which hung against 
the^wall near the window. Behind a dusty piece of 
glass it held what appeared to be a leaf from a small 
magazine or journal. “There,” said he, “you see 
a page from ‘The Grasshopper,’ a humorous paper 
which flourished in this city some half-dozen years 


308 HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTER. 


ago. I used to write regularly for that paper, as you 
may remember.” 

“Oh, yes, indeed!” I exclaimed. “And I shall 
never forget your ‘ Conundrum of the Anvil ’ which 
appeared in it. How often have I laughed at that most 
w'onderful conceit, and how often have I put it to my 
friends I ” 

Barbel gazed at me silently for a moment, and then 
he pointed to the frame. “That printed page,” he 
said solemnly, “contains the ‘Conundrum of the An- 
vil.' I hang it there, so that I can see it while I work. 
That conundrum ruined me. It was the last thing I 
wrote for ‘ The Grasshopper. ’ How I ever came to 
imagine it, I cannot tell. It is one of those things 
which occur to a man but once in a lifetime. After 
the wild shout of delight with which the public greeted 
that conundrum, my subsequent efforts met with hoots 
of derision. ‘ The Grasshopper ’ turned its hind-legs 
upon me. I sank from bad to worse, — much w^orse, 
until at last I found myself reduced to my present 
occupation, which is that of grinding points to pins. 
By this I procure my bread, coffee, and tobacco, and 
sometimes potatoes and meat. One da}^ while I was 
hard at work, an organ-grinder came into the street 
below. He played the serenade from Trovatore ; and 
the familiar notes brought back visions of old days 
and old delights, when the successful writer wore good 
clothes and sat at operas, when he looked into sweet 
eyes and talked of Italian airs, when his future ap- 
peared all a succession of bright sceneiy and joyous 
acts, without any provision for a di’op-curtain. And as 


ms WIFE’S DECEASED SISTER. 109 


my ear listened, and my mind wandered in this happy 
retrospect, m3' every faculty seemed exalted, and, with- 
out any thought upon the matter, I ground points upon 
my pins so fine, so regular, and smooth, that they would 
have pierced with ease the leather of a boot, or slipped 
among, without abrasion, the finest threads of rare old 
lace. When the organ stopped, and I fell back into 
my real world of cobwebs and mustiness, I gazed upon 
the pins I had just ground, and, without a moment’s 
hesitation, I threw them into the street, and reported 
the lot as spoiled. This cost me a little money, but it 
saved me my livelihood.” 

After a few moments of silence. Barbel resumed, — 

“ I have no more to say to you, my young friend. 
All I want you to do is to look upon that framed 
conundrum, then upon this grindstone, and then to 
go home and reflect. As for me, I have a gross of 
pins to grind before the sun goes down.” 

I cannot say that my depression of mind was at all 
relieved by what I had seen and heard. I had lost 
sight of Barbel for some 3"ears, and I had supposed 
him still floating on the sun-sparkling stream of pros- 
perity where I had last seen him. It was a great 
shock to me to And him in such a condition of pov- 
erty and squalor, and to see a man who had originated 
the “ Conundrum of the Anvil ” reduced to the soul- 
depressing occupation of grinding pin-points. As I 
walked and thought, the dreadful picture of a totally 
eclipsed future arose before my mind. The moral of 
Barbel sank deep into my heart. 

When I reached home I told my wife the story of 


110 HIS WIFE\S DECEASED SISTEB. 


my friend Barbel. She listened with a sad and eager 
interest. 

“ I am afraid,” she said, “if our fortunes do not 
quickly mend, that we shall have to buy two little 
grindstones. You know I could help you at that sort 
of thing.” 

For a long time we sat together and talked, and 
devised many plans for the future. I did not think 
it necessary yet for me to look out for a pin-contract ; 
but I must find some way of making money, or we 
should starve to death. Of course, the first thing that 
suggested itself was the possibility of finding some 
other business ; but, apart from the difficulty of imme- 
diately obtaining remunerative work in occupations to 
which I had not been trained, I felt a great and natu- 
ral reluctance to give up a profession for which I had 
carefully prepared myself, and which I had adopted as 
my life-work. It would be very hard for me to la}^ 
down my pen forever, and to close the top of my ink- 
stand upon all the bright and happy fancies which I 
had seen mirrored in its tranquil pool. We talked and 
pondered the rest of that day and a good deal of the 
night, but we came to no conclusion as to what it 
would be best for us to do. 

The next day I determined to go and call upon the 
editor of the journal for which, in happier days, before 
the blight of “His Wife’s Deceased Sister” rested 
upon me, I used most frequently to write, and, having 
frankly explained my condition to him, to ask his 
advice. The editor was a good man, and had always 
been my friend. He listened with great attention to 


ms WIFE'S DECEASED SISTER. Ill 


what I told him, and evidently sympathized with me in 
my tronble. 

“As we have written to you,” he said, “the only 
reason why we did not accept the manuscripts you 
sent us was, that they would have disappointed the 
high hopes that the public had formed in regard to 
you. We have had letter after letter asking when we 
were going to publish another story like ‘ His Wife’s 
Deceased Sister.’ We felt, and we still feel, that it 
would be wrong to allow you to destroy the fair fabric 
which yourself has raised. But,” he added, with a 
kind smile, “ I see very plainly that your well-deserved 
reputation will be of little advantage to you if you 
should starve at the moment that its genial beams are, 
so to speak, lighting you up.” 

“Its beams are not genial,” I answered. “They 
have scorched and withered me.” 

“How would you like,” said the editor, after a 
short reflection, “ to allow us to publish the stories 
you have recently written under some other name than 
your own? That would satisfy us and the public, 
would put money in your pocket, and would not inter- 
fere with your reputation.” 

Joyfully I seized that noble fellow by the hand, and 
instantly accepted his proposition. “ Of course,” said 
I “ a reputation is a very good thing ; but no reputa- 
tion can take the place of food, clothes, and a house 
to live in ; and I gladly agree to sink my over-illumined 
name into oblivion, and to appear before the public as 
a new and unknown writer.” 

“ I hope that need not be for long,” he said, “ for 


112 BIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTER. 


I feel sure that you will yet write stories as good as 
‘ His Wife’s Deceased Sister.’ ” 

All the manuscripts I had on hand I now sent to 
my good friend the editor, and in due and ])roper 
order they appeared in his journal under the name of 
John Darmstadt, which I had selected as a substitute 
for my own, permanently disabled. I made a similar 
arrangement with other editors, and John Darmstadt 
received the credit of every thing that proceeded from 
my pen. Our cu'cumstances now became very com- 
fortable, and occasionally we even allowed ourselves 
to indulge in little dreams of prosperity. 

Time passed on very pleasantly ; one year, another, 
and then a little son was born to us. It is often diffi- 
cult, I believe, for thoughtful persons to decide whether 
the beginning of their conjugal career, or the earliest 
veeks in the life of their fii*st-bom, be the happiest 
and proudest period of their existence. For myself I 
can only say that the same exaltation of mind, the 
same rarefication of idea and invention, which suc- 
ceeded upon my wedding-day came upon me now. As 
then, my ecstatic emotions crystallized themselves into 
a motive for a story, and without delay I set myself to 
work upon it. My boy was about six weeks old when 
the manuscript was finished ; and one evening, as we 
sat before a comfortable fire in our sitting-room, with 
the curtains drawn, and the soft lamp lighted, and the 
baby sleeping soundly in the adjoining chamber, I 
read the story to my wife. 

When I had finished, my wife arose, and threw her- 
self into my arms. “ I was never so proud of you,” 


HIS WIFE'S DECEASED SISTER. 113 


she said, her glad eyes sparkling, “ as I am at this 
moment. That is a wonderful story ! It is, indeed I 
am sure it is, just as good as ‘ His Wife’s Deceased 
Sister.’ ” 

As she spoke these words, a sudden and chilling sen- 
sation crept over us both. All her warmth and fervor, 
and the proud and happy glow engendered within me 
by this praise and appreciation from one I loved, van- 
ished in an instant. We stepped apart, and gazed 
upon each other with pallid faces. In the same mo- 
ment the terrible truth had flashed upon us both. 

This story was as good as “ His Wife’s Deceased 
Sister”! 

We stood silent. The exceptional lot of Barbel’s 
sui)er-pointed pins seemed to pierce our very souls. A 
dreadful vision rose before me of an impending fall 
and crash, in which our domestic happiness should 
vanish, and our prospects for our boy be wrecked, just 
as we had begun to build them up. 

My wife approached me, and took my hand in hers, 
which was as cold as ice. “ Be strong and Ann,” she 
said. “ A great danger threatens us, but you must 
brace yourself against it. Be strong and finn.” 

I pressed her hand, and we said no more that night. 

The next day I took the manuscript I had just writ- 
ten, and carefully enfolded it in stout wrapping-paper. 
Then I went to a neighboring grocery store, and bought 
a small, strong, tin box, originally intended for biscuit, 
with a cover that fitted tightly. In this I placed my 
manuscript ; and then I took the box to a tinsmith, 
and had the top fastened on with hard solder. When 


114 HIS WIFE’S DECEASED SISTEB. 


I went home I ascended into the garret, and brought 
down to my study a ship’s cash-box, which had once 
belonged to one of m3" famil3’ who was a sea-captain. 
This box was ver3" heavy, and firmly bound with iron, 
and was secured by two massive locks. Calling my 
wife, I told her of the contents of the tin case, which 
I then placed in the box, and, having shut down the 
heavy lid, I doubly locked it. 

“ This key,” said I, putting it in my pocket, “ I 
shall throw into the river when I go out this after- 
noon.” 

My wife watched me eagerly, with a pallid and firm, 
set countenance, but upon which I could see the faint 
glimmer of returning happiness. 

‘‘ Wouldn’t it be well,” she said, “ to secure it still 
further by sealing-wax and pieces of tape? ” 

“ No,” said I. “I do not believe that an}" one will 
attempt to tamper with our prosperity. And now, my 
dear,” I continued in an impressive voice, “no one 
but you, and, in the course of time, our son, shall 
know that this manuscript exists. When I am dead, 
those who survive me may, if they see fit, cause this 
box to be split open, and the story published. The 
reputation it may give my name cannot harm me 
then.” 


OUR STORY. 


I. 

I BECAME acquainted with Miss Bessie Vancouver 
at a reception given by an eminent literary gentle- 
man in New York. The circumstances were a little 
peculiar. Miss Vancouver and I had each written and 
recently published a book ; and we were introduced to 
each other as young authors whose works had made 
us known to the public, and who, consequently, should 
know each other. The peculiarity of the situation lay 
in the fact that I had not read Miss Vancouver’s book, 
nor had she read mine. Consequently, although each 
felt bound to speak of the work of the other, neither 
of us could do it except in the most general and cau- 
tious way. I was quite sure that her book was a novel, 
but that was all that I knew about it, except that I 
had heard it well spoken of ; but she supposed my 
book was of a scientific character, whereas, in reality, 
it also was a novel, although its title did not indicate 
the fact. There was therefore an air of restraint and 
stiffness about our first interview which it might not 
have had if we had frankly acknowledged our short- 

115 


116 


OUR STORY. 


comings. But, as the general conversation led her to 
believe that she was the only person in the room who 
had not read my book, and me to believe that I was 
the only one who had not read hers, we were naturally 
loath to confess the truth to each other. 

I next met Miss Vancouver in Paris, at the house 
of a lady whose parlors are the frequent rendezvous of 
Americans, especially those given to art or literature. 
This time we met on different ground. I had read her 
book and she mine ; and as soon as we had shaken 
hands we began to talk of each other’s work, not as if 
it had been the beginning, of a new conversation, but 
rather as the continuation of one broken off. Each 
liked the book of the other extremely, and we were 
free to say so. 

But I am not satisfied with my novel,” said Miss 
Vancouver. “ There is too much oneness about it ; by 
which I mean that it is not diversified enough. It is 
all, or nearly all, hbout two people, who, of course, 
have but one object in life; and it seems to me now 
that their story might have been finished a great deal 
sooner, though, of course, in that case it would not 
have been long enough to make a book.” 

To this I politely answered that I did not agree with 
her, for the story was interesting to the very end ; but, 
of course, if she had put more characters into it, and 
they had been as good in their way as those she already 
had, the book would have been that much the better. 
‘‘As for me,” I continued, “my trouble is entirely 
the other way. I have no oneness whatever. My 
tendency is much more to fifteen or twenty-ness. I 


OUB STOBY. 


117 


carry a story a little way in one direction, and then 
I stop and go off in another. It is sometimes difficult 
to make it understood why a character should have been 
brought into the story at all ; and I have had a good 
deal of trouble in making some of them do something 
toward the end to show that they are connected with 
the general plot.” 

She said she had noticed that there was a wideness 
of scope in my book ; but what she would have said 
further I do not know, for our hostess now came down 
upon us and carried off Miss Vancouver to introduce 
her to an old lady who had successfully steered about 
fifty barques across that sea on which Miss Vancouver 
had just set out. 

Our next meeting was in a town on the Mediterra- 
nean, in the south of France. I had secured board at 
a large pension there, and was delighted to find that 
Miss Bessie Vancouver and her mother were already 
inmates of the house. As soon as I had the oppor- 
tunity, I broached to her an idea which had frequently 
possessed my mind since our conversation in Paris. I 
proposed that we should write a story together, some- 
thing like Erckmann-Chatrian, or Mark Twain and Mr. 
Warner in “The Gilded Age.” Since she had too 
much unity of purpose and travelled in too narrow a 
path, and I branched off too much, and had too great 
a tendency to variety, our styles, if properly blended, 
would possess all the qualities needed in a good story ; 
and there was no reason why we should not, writing 
thus together, achieve a success greater, perhaps, than 
either of us could expect writing alone. I had thought 


118 


OUR STORY. 


so much on this subject that I was able to say a great 
deal, and to say it pretty well, too, so far as I could 
judge. Miss Vancouver listened with great attention, 
and the more I said, the more the idea pleased her. 
She said she would take the afternoon to consider the 
matter ; and in the evening she told me in the parlor 
that she had made up her mind, if I still thought well 
of the plan, to assist me in writing a story, — this being 
the polite way in which she chose to put it, — but that 
she thought it would be better for us to begin with a 
short story, and not with a book, for in this way we 
could sooner see how we would be likely to succeed. 
Of course I agreed to this proposition, and we arranged 
that we should meet the next morning in the garden 
and lay out a plan for our story. 

The garden attached to the house in which we lived 
was a very quaint and pleasant one. It had been made 
a hundi'ed years ago or more by an Italian nobleman, 
whose mansion, now greatly altered, had become our 
present pension. The garden was laid out in a series 
of terraces on the side of a hill, and abounded in 
walks shaded by orange and lemon trees, arbors, and 
vine-covered trellises ; fountains, half concealed by 
overhanging ivy ; and suddenly discovered stair- ways, 
wide and shadow}’, leading up into regions of greater 
quaintness and seclusion. Flowers were here, and 
palm-trees, and great cactus-bushes, with their red 
fruit half hollowed out by the nibbling birds. From 
the upper ten*aces we could see the blue Mediterra- 
nean spreading far away on one side, while the snow- 
covered tops of the Maritime Alps stood bright against 


OUR STORY. 


119 


the sky. The garden was little frequented, and alto- 
gether it was a good place in which to plan a story. 

We consulted together for several days before we 
actually began to work. At first, we sat in an arbor 
on one of the lower terraces, where there were a little 
iron table and some chairs ; but now and then a per- 
son would come there for a morning stroll, and so we 
moved up higher to a seat under a palm-tree, and the 
next day to another terrace, where there was a secluded 
corner overshadowed by huge cacti. But the place 
which suited us best of all was the top of an old tower 
at one end of the garden. This tower had been built 
many, many hundred j^ears before the garden was 
thought of, and its broad, flat roof was level with one 
of the higher terraces. Here we could work and con- 
sult in quiet, with little fear of being disturbed. 

Not finding it easy to plan out the whole story at 
once, we determined to begin by preparing back- 
grounds. We concluded that as this was to be a short 
story, it would be sufficient to have descriptions of two 
natural scenes in which the two principal incidents 
should occur ; and as we wished to do all our work 
from natural models, we thought it best to describe 
the scene which lay around us, than which nothing 
could be more beautiful or more suitable. One scene 
was to be on the sea-shore, with a mellow light upon 
the rippling waves, and the sails of fishing- vessels in 
the distance. This Miss Vancouver was to do, while 
I was to take a scene among the hills and mountains 
at the back of the town. I walked over there one 
afternoon when Miss Vancouver had gone out with her 


120 


OUR STORY. 


mother. I got on a high point, and worked up a very 
satisfactory description of the frowning mountains be- 
hind me, the old monasteries on the hills, and the town 
stretching out below, with a little river rushing along 
between two rows of picturesque washerwomen to the 
sea. 

We read our backgrounds to each other, and were 
both very well satisfied. Our styles were as different 
as the scenes we described. Hers was clear and 
smooth, and mine forcible and somewhat abrupt, and 
thus the strong points of each scene were better 
brought out ; but, in order that our styles might be 
unified, so to speak, by being judiciously blended, 
I suggested some strong and effective points to be 
introduced into her description, while she toned down 
some of my phrases, and added a word here and there 
which gave a color and beauty to the description which 
it had not possessed before. 

Our backgrounds being thus satisfactory, — and it 
took a good deal of consultation to make them so, — 
our next work was to provide characters for the story. 
These were to be drawn from life, for it would be per- 
fectly ridiculous to create imaginary characters when 
there were so many original and interesting personages 
around us. We soon agreed upon an individual who 
would serve as a model for our hero ; I forget whether 
it was I or Miss Vancouver who first suggested him. 
He was a young man, but not so very young either, 
who lived in the house with us, and about whom there 
was a mystery. Nobody knew exactly who he was, or 
where he came from, or why he was here. It was evi- 


OUB STOBT. 


121 


dent he did not come for society, for he kept very 
much to himself ; and the attractions of the town could 
not have brought him here, for he seemed to care very 
little about them. We seldom saw him except at the 
table and occasionally in the garden. When we met 
him in the latter place, he always seemed anxious to 
avoid observ^ation ; and as we did not wish to hurt his 
feelings by letting him suppose that he was an object 
of curiosity to us, we endeavored, as far as possible, 
to make it apparent that we were not looking at him 
or thinking of him. But still, whenever we had a good 
chance, we studied him. Of course, we could not 
make out his mystery, but that was not necessaiy, nor 
did we, indeed, think it would be proper. We could 
draw him as we saw him, and then make the mystery 
what we pleased ; its character depending a good deal 
upon the plot we devised. 

Miss Vancouver undertook to draw the hero, and 
she went to work upon him immediately. In personal 
appearance, she altered the model a good deal. She 
darkened his hair, and took off his whiskers, leaving 
him only a mustache. She thought, too, that he ought 
to be a little taller, and asked me my height, which is 
five feet nine. She considered that a very good height, 
and brought the hero up to it. She also made him 
some years younger, but endeavored, as far as seemed 
suitable to the story, to draw him exactly as he was. 

I was to do the heroine, but found it very hard to 
choose a model. As I said before, we determined 
to draw all our characters from life, but I could think 
of no one, in the somewhat extensive company by 


122 


OUE STOBT. 


which we were surrounded, who would answer my pur- 
pose. Nor could I fix my mind upon any person in 
other parts of the world, whom I knew or had known, 
who resembled the idea I had formed of our heroine. 
After thinking this matter over a good deal, I told 
Miss Vancouver that I believed the best thing I could 
do would be to take her for my model. I was with 
her a good deal, and thus could study out and work 
up certain points as I wrote, which would be a great 
advantage. She objected to this, because, as she said, 
the author of a story should not be drawn as its hero- 
ine. But I asserted that this would not be the case. 
She would merely suggest the heroine to me, and I 
would so do my work that the heroine would not sug- 
gest her to anybody else. This, I thought, was the 
way in which a model ought to be used. After we 
had talked the subject over a good deal, she agreed to 
m}^ plan, and I went to work with much satisfaction. 
I gave no definite description of the lady, but endeav- 
ored to indicate the impression which her person and 
character produced upon me. As such impressions are 
seldom the same in any two cases, there was no dan- 
ger that my description could be referred back to her. 

When I read to her the sketch I had written, she 
objected to parts of it as not being correct ; but as I 
asserted that it was not intended as an exact copy of 
the model, she could not say it was not a true picture ; 
and so, with some slight modifications, we let it stand. 
I thought myself that it was a very good piece of work. 
To me it seemed very life-like and piquant, and I 
believed that other people would think it so. 


OUB STOBY. 


123 


We were now ready for the incidents and the plot, 
but at this point we were somewhat interrupted by 
Mrs. Vancouver. She came to me one morning, when 
I was waiting to go with her daughter to our stud}^ in 
the garden, and told me that she was very sorry to 
notice that Miss Vancouver and I had attracted atten- 
tion to ourselves by being so much together ; and, while 
she understood the nature of the literary labor on "svhich 
we were engaged, she did not wish her daughter to 
become the object of general attention and remark in 
a foreign pension. I was very angry when I heard 
that people had been directing upon us their imperti- 
nent curiosity, and I discoursed warmly upon the 
subject. 

“ Where is the good,” I said, “ of a person or per- 
sons devoting himself or themselves, with enthusiasm 
and earnestness, to his or their life-work, if he or they 
are to be interfered with by the impertinent babble of 
the multitude? ” 

Mrs. Vancouver was not prepared to give an exact 
answer to this question, but she considered the babble 
of the multitude a very serious thing. She had been 
talking to her daughter on the subject, and thought it 
right to speak to me. 

That morning we worked separately in our rooms, 
but we accomplished little or nothing. It was, of 
course, impossible to do any thing of importance in a 
work of this kind without consultation and co-opera- 
tion. The next day, however, I devised a plan which 
would enable us, I thought, to pursue our labors with- 
out attracting attention ; and Mrs. Vancouver, who 


124 


OUR STORY. 


was a kind-hearted woman, and took a great interest 
in her daughter’s literary career, told me if I could 
successfully carry out any thing of the kind, I might 
do so. She did not inquire into particulars, nor did I 
explain them to Miss Bessie ; but I told the latter that 
we would not go out together into the garden, but I 
would go first, and she should join me about ten min- 
utes afterward on the tower ; but she was not to come 
if she saw any one about. 

Near the top of the hill, above the garden, once 
stood an ancient mansion, of which nothing now 
remained but the remnants of some massive masonry. 
A court-yard, however, of this old edifice was still 
surrounded by a high wall, which formed the upper 
boundary of our garden. From a point near the tower 
a flight of twisting stone steps, flanked by blank walls, 
which turned themselves in various directions to suit 
the angles of the stair-way, led to a green door in this 
wall. Through this door Miss Vancouver and myself, 
and doubtless many other persons, had often wished 
to pass ; but it was locked, and, on inquiry, we found 
that there was no key to be had. The day previous, 
however, when wandering by myself, I had examined 
this door, and found that it was fastened merely by 
a snap-lock which had no handle, but was opened by a 
key. I had a knife with a long, strong blade, and 
pushing this into the hasp, I easily forced back the 
bolt. I then opened the door and walked into the old 
court-yard. 

When Miss Vancouver appeared on the tower, I was 
standing at the top of the stone steps just mentioned, 


OUR STORY. 


125 


with the green door slightly ajar. Calling to her in a 
low tone, she ran up the steps, and, to her amazement, 
I ushered her into the court-yard and closed the door 
behind us. 

“There,” I exultingly exclaimed, “is our study, 
where we can write our story without interruption. 
We will come and go away separately ; the people of 
the pension will not know that we are here or have 
been here, and there will be no occasion for that im- 
pertinent attention to which your mother so properly 
objects.” 

Miss Vancouver was delighted, and we walked about 
and surveyed the court-yard with much satisfaction. 
I had already selected the spot for our work. It was 
in the shade of an olive-tree, the only tree in the enclo- 
sure, beneath which there was a rude seat. I spread a 
rug upon the grass, and Miss Bessie sat upon the seat, 
and put her feet upon the rug, leaving room for me to 
sit thereon. We now took out our little blank-books 
and our stylograph pens and were ready for work. I 
explained that I had done nothing the day before, and 
Miss Vancouver said that had also been the case with 
her. She had not wished to do any thing important 
without consultation ; but supposing that, of course, 
the hero was to fall in love with the heroine, she 
thought she might as well make him begin, but she 
found she could not do it as she wished. She wanted 
him to indicate to the lady that he was in love with her 
without exactly saying so. Could I not suggest some 
good form for giving expression to this stat« of things ? 
After a little reflection, I thought I could. 


126 


OUR STORY. 


“I will speak,” said I, “ as if I were the hero, and 
then you can see how it will suit.” 

“Yes,” said she, “but you must not forget that 
what you say should be very gradual.” 

I tried to be as gradual as I could, and to indicate 
by slow degrees the state of mind in which we wished 
our hero to be. As the indication became stronger and 
stronger, I thought it right to take Miss Vancouver’s 
hand ; but to this she objected, because, as she said, 
it was more than indication, and besides, it prevented 
her from writing down what I said. We argued this 
point a little while without altering our position, and I 
asserted that the hand-holding only gave point and 
earnestness to the hero’s remarks, which otherwise 
would not be so natural and true to life ; and if she 
wanted to use her right hand, her left hand would do 
to hold. We made this change, and I proceeded with 
the hero’s remarks. 

There was in our pension a young German girl named 
Margarita. She was a handsome, plump maiden, and 
spoke English very well. There was another young 
lad}", also a German, named Gretzel. She was a little 
creature and the fast friend of Margarita. These two 
had a companion whose name I did not know. She 
was a little older than the others, and was, I think, a 
Pole. She also understood English. As I was warm- 
ing up toward the peroration of our hero’s indication, 
I raised my eyes, and saw, on the brow of the hill, not 
a stone’s throw from us, these three guis. They were 
talking earnestly and walking directly toward us. The 
place where they were was used as a public pleasure- 


OUM STOUT. 


127 


ground, and was separated from the old court-yard by 
a pale-fence. Although the girls could not come to us, 
there was nothing to prevent their seeing us if they 
chose to look our way, for they were on ground which 
was higher than the top of the fence. 

When I saw these girls, I was horror-stricken, and 
my knees, on which I rested, trembled beneath me. 
I did not dare to rise, nor to change my position, for 
fear the motion should attract attention ; nor did I 
cease my remarks, for had I suddenly done so, my 
companion would have locked around to see what was 
the matter, and would certainly have jumped up, or 
have done something which would have brought the 
eyes of those girls upon us ; but my voice dropped 
very low, and I wondered if there was any way of my 
gently rolling out of sight. 

But at this moment our young man with a mystery 
suddenly appeared on the other side of the fence, walk- 
ing rapidly toward the girls. There was something on 
the ocean, probably a ship, to which he directed their 
attention ; and then he actually led them off, pointing, 
as it appeared, to a spot from which the distant object 
could be more plainl}^ seen. They all walked away and 
disappeared behind the brow of the hill. With a great 
feeling of relief, I arose and recounted what had hap- 
pened. Miss Vancouver sprang to her feet, shut up her 
blank-book, and put the stopper on her stylograph. 

“ This place will not do at all to work in,” she said. 
“ I will not have those girls staring at us.” 

I was obliged to admit that this particular spot 
would not do. I had not thought of any one walk- 


128 


oun STORY. 


ing in the grounds immediately above us, especially 
in the morning, which was our working time. 

“They may return,” she said, “and we must go 
away immediatel}" and separately.” 

But I could not agree thns to give up our new-found 
study. The enclosure was quite extensive, with ruins 
at the other end, near which we might find some spot 
entirely protected from obseiwation. So I went to look 
for such a place, leaving Miss Vancouver under the 
olive-tree, where, if she were seen alone, it would not 
matter. 1 found a spot which might answer, and, re- 
turning to the tree, sent her to look at it. While we 
were thus engaged, we heard the report of the noon 
cannon. This startled us both. The hour for 
dejeHner d la fourchette at the pension was twelve 
o’clock, and people were generally very prompt at 
that meal. It would not do for us to be late. 
Snatching up our effects, we hurried to the green door, 
but when I tried to open it as before, I found it im- 
possible — a projecting stiip of wood on the inside of 
the door-way preventing my reaching the bolt with my 
knife-blade. I tried to tear away the strip, but it was 
too firmly fastened. We both became very ners^ous 
and troubled. It was impossible to get out of the 
enclosure except through that door, for the w'all was 
quite high and the top covered with broken glass em- 
bedded in the mortar. The party on the hill had had 
time to go down and around through the town to the 
pension. Our places at the table would be the only 
ones empty. What could attract more attention than 
this ? And what would Mrs. Vancouver think and say ? 


OUR STORY. 


129 


At this moment we heard some one working at the 
lock on the other side. The door opened, and there 
stood our hero. 

“I heard some one at this door,” he said; “and 
supposing it had been accidentally closed, I came up 
and opened it.” 

“ Thank you ; thank you very much ! ” cried Miss 
Vancouver. 

And away she ran to the house. If only I were 
late, it did not matter at all. I followed with our hero, 
and endeavored to make some explanation of the pre- 
dicament of myself and the young lady. He took it 
all as a matter of course, as if the old court-yard were 
a place of general resort. 

“When persons stroll through that door,” he said, 
“they should put a piece of stick or of stone against 
the jamb, so that if the door is blown shut by the 
wind the latch may not catch.” 

And then he called my attention to a beautiful plant 
of the aloe kind which had just begun to blossom. 

Miss Vancouver reached the breakfast-table in good 
time, but she told me afterward she would work in the 
old court-yard no more. The perils were too many. 

For some days after this our story made little pro- 
gress, for opportunities for consultation did not occur. 
I was particularly sorry for this, because I wanted very 
much to know how Miss Vancouver liked my indicative 
speech and what she had made of it. Early one after- 
noon about this time our hero, between whom and my- 
self a slight acquaintance had sprung up, came to me 
and said : 


130 


OUB STOBY. 


“ The sea is so perfectly smooth and quiet to-day 
that I thought it would be pleasant to take a row, and 
I have hired a boat. How would you like to go with 
me? ’’ 

I was pleased with his friendly proposition, and I 
am very fond of rowing ; but yet I hesitated about 
accepting the invitation, for I hoped that afternoon to 
find some opportunity for consultation in regard to the 
work on which I was engaged. 

“ The boat is rather large for two persons,” he re- 
marked. “Have you any friends you would like to 
ask to go with us ? ” 

This put a different phase upon affairs. I instantly 
said that I thought a row would be charming that after- 
noon, and suggested that Mrs. Vancouver and her 
daughter might like to take advantage of the oppor- 
tunity. 

The ladies were quite willing to go, and in twenty 
minutes we set off, two fishermen in red liberty caps 
pushing us from the pebbly beach. Our hero took one 
oar and I another, and we pulled together very well. 
The ladies sat in the stern, and enjoyed the smooth sea 
and the lovely day. We rowed across the little bay 
and around a high promontory, where there was a 
larger bay with a small town in the distance. The 
hero suggested that we should land here, as we could 
get some good views from the rocks. To this we all 
agreed ; and when we had climbed up a little distance, 
Mrs. Vancouver found some wild fiowers which inter- 
ested her very much. She was, in a certain way, a 
floraphobist, and took an especial delight in finding in 


OUR STORY. 


131 


foreign countries blossoms which were the same as or 
similar to flowers she was familiar with in New Eng- 
land. Our hero had also a fancy for wild flowers, 
and it was not long before he showed Mrs. Vancouver 
a little blossom which she was very sure she had seen 
either at East Gresham or Milton Centre. Leaving 
these two to their floral researches, Miss Vancouver 
and I climbed higher up the rocks, where the view 
would be better. We found a pleasant ledge ; and 
although we could not see what was going on below 
us, and the view was quite cut off in the direction of 
the town, we ’had an admirable outlook over the sea, 
on which, in the far distance, we could see the sails 
of a little vessel. 

“ This will be an admirable place to do a little 
work on our story,” I said. “ I have brought my 
blank-book and stylograph.” 

“ And so have I,” said she. 

I then told her that I had been thinking over the mat- 
ter a good deal, and that I believed in a short story 
two long speeches would be enough for the hero to 
make, and proposed that we should now go on with the 
second one. She thought well of that, and took a seat 
upon a rocky projection, while I sat upon another quite 
near. 

‘‘ This second speech,” said I, “ ought to be more 
than indicative, and should express the definite purpose 
of the hero’s sentiments ; and I think there should be 
corresponding expressions from the heroine, and would 
be glad to have you suggest such as you think she 
would make.” I then began to say what I thought a 


132 


OUB STOUT.- 


hero ought to say under the circumstances. I soon 
warmed up to my task wonderfully, and expressed 
with much earnestness and ardor the sentiments I 
thought proper for the occasion. I first held one of 
Miss Vancouver’s hands, and then both of them, she 
trusting to her memory in regard to memoranda. Her 
remarks in the character of the heroine were, however, 
much briefer than mine, but they were enough. If 
necessary, they could be worked up and amplified. I 
think we had said all or nearly all there was to say 
when we heard a shout from below. It was our hero 
calling us. We could not see him, but I knew his 
voice. He shouted again, and then I arose from the 
rock on which Bessie was sitting and answered him. 
He now made his appearance some distance below us, 
and said that Mrs. Vancouver did not care to come up 
any higher to get the views, and that she thought it 
would be better to reach home before the sun should 
set. 

That evening, in the salon, Bessie spoke to me apart. 
“ Our hero,” she said, “is more than a hero ; he is a 
guardian angel. You must fathom his mystery. I 
am sure that it is far better than any thing we can 
invent for him.” 

I set myself to work to discover, if possible, not 
only the mystery which had first interested us in our 
hero, but also the reason and purpose of his guardian- 
angelship. He was an American, and now that I had 
come to know him better, I found him a very agree- 
able talker. 


OUB STORY. 


133 


n. 

Our hero was the first person whom I told of my en- 
gagement to Bessie. Mrs. Vancouver was very par- 
ticular that this state of affairs should be made known. 
“If you are engaged,” she said, “of course you can 
be together as much as you please. It is the custom 
in America, and nobody need make any remarks.” 

In talking to our hero, I told him of a good many 
little things that had happened at various times, and 
endeavored by these friendly confidences to make him 
speak of his own affah-s. It must not be supposed 
that I was actuated by prying curiosity, but certainly 
I had a right to know something of a person to whom 
I had told so much ; but he always seemed a great 
deal more interested in us than in himself, and I took 
so much interest in his interest, which was very kindly 
expressed, that his affairs never came into our conver- 
sation. 

But just as he was going away, — he left the little 
town a few days before we did, — he told me that he 
was a writer, and that for some time past he had been 
engaged upon a story. 

Our story was never finished. His was. This is it. 


MR. TOLMAN. 


R. TOLMAN was a gentleman whose apparent 



age was of a varyiag character. At times, when 
deep in thought on business matters or other affairs, 
one might have thought him fifty-five or fifty-seven, or 
even sixty. Ordinarily, however, when things were 
running along in a satisfactory and commonplace way, 
he appeared to be about fifty years old, while upon 
some extraordinary occasions, when the world assumed 
an unusually attractive aspect, his age seemed to run 
down to forty-five or less. 

He was the head of a business firm ; in fact, he was 
the only member of it. The firm was known as Pusey 
and Co. ; but Pusey had long been dead, and the “Co.,’* 
of which Mr. Tolman had been a member, was dis- 
solved. Our elderly hero having bought out the busi- 
ness, firm name and all, for many years had carried it 
on with success and profit. His counting-house was a 
small and quiet place, but a great deal of money had 
been made in it. Mr. Tolman was rich — very rich 
indeed. 

And yet as he sat in his counting-room one winter 


134 : 


MB. TOLMAN. 


135 


evening he looked his oldest. He had on his hat and 
his overcoat, his gloves and his fur collar. Every one 
else in the establishment had gone home ; and he, with 
the keys in his hand, was ready to lock up and leave 
also. He often staid later than any one else, and left 
the keys with Mr. Canterfield, the head clerk, as he 
passed his house on his way home. 

Mr. Tolman seemed in no hurry to go. He simply 
sat and thought, and increased his apparent age. The 
truth was he did not want to go home. He was tired 
of going home. This was not because his home was 
not a pleasant one. No single gentleman in the city 
had a handsomer or more comfortable suite of rooms. 
It was not because he felt lonely, or regretted that a 
wife and children did not brighten and enliven his home. 
He was perfectly satisfied to be a bachelor. The con- 
ditions suited him exactly. But, in spite of all this, he 
was tired of going home. 

“I wish,” said Mr. Tolman to himself, “that I could 
feel some interest in going home ; ’ ’ and then he rose 
and took a turn or two up and down the room ; but 
as that did not seem to give him any more interest in 
the matter, he sat down again. “ I wish it were neces- 
saiy for me to go home,” said he; “but it isn’t; ” 
and then he fell again to thinking. “What I need,” 
he said, after a while, “is to depend more upon my- 
self — to feel that I am necessary to myself. Just now 
I’m not. I’ll stop going home — at least in this way. 
Where’s the sense in envying other men, when I can 
have all that they have, just as well as not? And I’ll 
have it, too,” said Mr. Tolman, as he went out and 


136 


MB. TOLMAN. 


locked the doors. Once in the streets, and walking 
rapidly, his ideas shaped themselves easily and readily 
into a plan which, by the time he reached the house of 
his head clerk, was quite matured. Mr. Canterfield 
was just going down to dinner as his employer rang 
the bell, so he opened the door himself. ‘‘ I will detain 
you but a minute or two,” said Mr. Tolman, handing 
the keys to Mr. Canterfield. Shall we step into the 
parlor? ” 

When his employer had gone, and Mr. Canterfield 
had joined his family at the dinner table, his wife im- 
mediately asked him what Mr. Tolman wanted. 

“ Only to say that he is going away to-morrow, and 
that I am to attend to the business, and send his per- 
sonal letters to ,” naming a city not a hundred 

miles away. 

“ How long is he going to stay? ” 

“ He didn’t say,” answered Mr. Canterfield. 

“ I’ll tell you what he ought to do,” said the lady. 
“ He ought to make you a partner in the firm, and then 
he could go away and stay as long as he pleased.” 

“ He can do that now,” returned her husband. “ He 
has made a good many trips since I have been with him, 
and things have gone on very much in the same way as 
when he was here. He knows that.” 

“ But still you’d like to be a partner? ” 

“Oh, yes,” said Mr. Canterfield. 

“And common gratitude ought to prompt him to 
make you one,” said his wife. 

Mr. Tolman went home and wrote a will. He left 
all his property, with the exception of a few legacies, 


MR, TOLMAN. 


137 


to the richest and most powerful charitable organiza- 
tion in the country. 

“ People will think I’m crazy,” said he to himself ; 
“ and if I should die while I am carrying out my plan, 
I’ll leave the task of defending my sanity to people 
who are able to make a good fight for me.” And be- 
fore he went to bed he had his will signed and witnessed. 

The next day he packed a trunk and left for the neigh- 
boring city. His apartments were to be kept in readi- 
ness for his return at any time. If you had seen him 
walking over to the railroad d4p6t, you would have 
taken him for a man of forty-five. 

When he arrived at his destination, Mr. Tolman es- 
tablished himself temporarily at a hotel, and spent the 
next three or four days in walking about the city look- 
ing for what he wanted. What he wanted was rather 
diflScult to define, but the way in which he put the mat- 
ter to himself was something like this : 

“I’d like to find a snug little place where I can live 
and carry on some business which I can attend to my- 
self, and which will bring me into contact with people 
of all sorts — people who will interest me. It must be 
a small business, because I don’t want to have to work 
very hard, and it must be snug and comfortable, be- 
cause I want to enjoy it. I would like a shop of some 
sort, because that brings a man face to face with his 
fellow-creatures. ’ ’ 

The city in which he was walking about was one of 
the best places in the country in which to find the place 
of business he desired. It was full of independent 
little shops. But Mr. Tolman could not readily find 


138 


MB. TOLMAN. 


one which resembled his ideal. A small dry-goods es- 
tablishment seemed to presuppose a female proprietor. 
A grocery store would give him many interesting cus- 
tomers ; but he did not know much about gi’oceries, 
and the business did not appear to him to possess any 
{esthetic features. He was much pleased by a small 
shop belonging to a taxidermist. It was exceedingly 
cosey, and the business was probably not so great as to 
overwork any one. He might send the birds and beasts 
which were brought to be stuffed to some practical 
operator, and have him put them in proper condition 
for the customers. He might — But no ; it would be 
very unsatisfactory to engage in a business of which he 
knew absolutely nothing. A taxidermist ought not to 
blush with ignorance when asked some simple question 
about a little dead bird or a defunct fish. And so he 
tore himself from the window of this fascinating place, 
where, he fancied, had his education been differently 
managed, he could in time have shown the world the 
spectacle of a cheerful and unblighted Mr. Venus. 

The shop which at last appeared to suit him best 
was one which he had passed and looked at several 
times before it struck him favorably. It was in a small 
brick house in a side street, but not far from one of the 
main business avenues of the city. The shop seemed 
devoted to articles of stationery and small notions of 
various kinds not easy to be classified. He had stopped 
to look at three penknives fastened to a card, which 
was propped up in the little show-window, supported 
on one side by a chess-board with ‘‘ History of Asia ” in 
gilt letters on the back, and on the other by a small 


MB. TOLMAN. 


139 


violin labelled “ 1 dollar ; ” and as he gazed past these 
articles into the interior of the shop, which was now 
lighted up, it gradually dawned upon him that it was 
something like his ideal of an attractive and interest- 
ing business place. At any rate he would go in and 
look at it. He did not care for a violin, even at the low 
price marked on the one in the window, but a new 
pocket-knife might be useful ; so he walked in and 
asked to look at pocket-knives. 

The shop was in charge of a ver}^ pleasant old lady 
of about sixty, who sat sewing behind the little count- 
er. While she went to the window, and very care- 
fully reached over the articles displayed therein to get 
the card of penknives, Mr. Tolman looked about him. 
The shop was quite small, but there seemed to be a 
good deal in it. There were shelves behind the count- 
er, and there were shelves on the opposite wall, and 
they all seemed well filled with something or other. 
In the corner near the old lady’s chair was a little coal 
stove with a bright fire in it, and at the back of the 
shop, at the top of two steps, was a glass door partly 
open, through which he saw a small room, with a red 
carpet on the floor, and a little table apparently set 
for a meal. 

Mr. Tolman looked at the knives when the old lady 
showed them to him, and after a good deal of consid- 
eration he selected one which he thought would be a 
good knife to give to a boy. Then he looked over some 
things in the way of paper-cutters, whist-markers, and 
such small matters, which were in a glass case on the 
counter; and while he looked at them he talked to 
the old lady. 


140 


MB. TOLMAN. 


She was a friendly, sociable body, and very glad to 
have any one to talk to, and so it was not at all dif- 
ficult for Mr. Tolman, by some general remarks, to 
draw from her a great many points about herself and 
her shop. She was a widow, with a son who, from 
her remarks, must have been forty years old. He was 
connected with a mercantile establishment, and they 
had lived here for a long time. While her son was a 
salesman, and came home every evening, this was ver}" 
pleasant ; but after he became a commercial traveller, 
and was away from the city for months at a time, she 
did not like it at all. It was very lonely for her. 

Mr. Tolman ’s heart rose within him, but he did not 
interrupt her. 

“ If I could do it,” said she, “ I would give up this 
place, and go and live with my sister in the country. 
It would be better for both of us, and Heni’y could 
come there just as well as here when he gets back from 
his trips.” 

“ Why don’t you sell out ? ” asked Mr. Tolman, a 
little fearfully, for he began to think that all this was 
too easy sailing to be entii'ely safe. 

“That would not be easy,” said she, with a smile. 
“ It might be a long time before we could find any one 
who would want to take the place. We have a fair 
trade in the store, but it isn’t what it used to be when 
times were better ; and the library is falling off too. 
Most of the books are getting pretty old, and it don’t 
pay to spend much money for new ones now.” 

“The library ! ” said Mr. Tolman. “ Have you a 
library ? ” 


MB. TOLMAN. 


141 


“ Oh, yes,” replied the old lady. “ I’ve had a circu- 
lating library here for nearly fifteen years. There it is 
on those two upper shelves behind you.” 

Mr. Tolman turned, and beheld two long rows of 
books, in brown paper covers, with a short step-ladder 
standing near the door of the inner room, by which 
these shelves might be reached. This pleased him 
greatly. He had had no idea that there was a library 
here. 

“ I declare ! ” said he. “ It must be very pleasant 
to manage a circulating library — a small one like this, 
I mean. I shouldn’t mind going into a business of the 
kind mj-self.” 

The old lady looked up, surprised. Did he wish to 
go into business ? She had not supposed that, just 
from looking at him. 

Mr. Tolman explained his views to her. He did not 
tell what he had been doing in the way of business, or 
what Mr. Canterfield was doing for him now. He 
merely stated his present wishes, and acknowledged to 
her that it was the attractiveness of her establishment 
that had led him to come in. 

“Then you do not want the penknife ?” she said, 
quickly. 

“ Oh, yes, I do,” said he ; “ and I really believe, if 
we can come to terms, that I would like the two other 
knives, together with the rest of your stock in trade.” 

The old lady laughed a little nervously. She hoped 
very much indeed that they could come to terms. She 
brought a chair from the back room, and Mr. Tolman 
sat down with her by the stove to talk it over. Few 


142 


MB. TOLMAN. 


customers came in to interrupt them, and they talked 
the matter over very thoroughly. They both came to 
the conclusion that there would be no difficulty about 
terms, nor about Mr. Tolman’s ability to carry on the 
business after a very little instruction from the present 
proprietress. When Mr. Tolman left, it was with the 
understanding that he was to call again in a couple of 
days, when the son Henry would be at home, and mat- 
ters could be definitely arranged. 

When the three met, the bargain was soon struck. 
As each party was so desirous of making it, few diffi- 
culties were interposed. The old lady, indeed, was in 
favor of some delay in the transfer of the establish- 
ment, as she would like to clean and dust every shelf 
and corner and every article in the place ; but Mr. Tol- 
man was in a hurry to take possession ; and as the son 
Henry would have to start off on another trip in a 
short time, he wanted to see his mother moved and set- 
tled before he left. There was not much to move but 
trunks and bandboxes, and some antiquated pieces of 
furniture of special value to the old lady, for Mr. Tol- 
man insisted on buying every thing in the house, just 
as it stood. The whole thing did not cost him, he said 
to himself, as much as some of his acquaintances 
would pay for a horse. The methodical son Henry 
took an account of stock, and Mr. Tolman took sev- 
eral lessons from the old lady, in which she explained 
to him how to find out the selling prices of the various 
articles from the marks on the little tags attached to 
them ; and she particularly instructed him in the man- 
agement of the circulating library. She informed him 


MB. TOLMAN. 


143 


of the character of the books, and, as far as possible, 
of the character of the regular patrons. She told him 
whom he might trust to take out a book without pay- 
ing for the one brought in, if they didn’t happen to 
have the change with them, and she indicated with little 
crosses opposite their names those persons who should 
be required to pay cash down for what they had had, 
before receiving further benefits. 

It was astonishing to see what interest Mr. Tolman 
took in all this. He was really anxious to mwet some 
of the people about whom the old lady discoursed. He 
tried, too, to remember a few of the many things she 
told him of her methods of buying and selling, and the 
general management of her shop ; and he probably did 
not forget more than three-fourths of what she told 
him. 

Finally, every thing was settled to the satisfaction of 
ihe two male parties to the bargain — although the old 
lady thought of a hundred things she would yet like to 
do — and one fine frosty afternoon a car-load of furni- 
ture and baggage left the door, the old lady and her 
son took leave of the old place, and Mr. Tolman was 
left sitting behind the little counter, the sole manager 
and proprietor of a circulating library and a stationery 
and notion shop. He laughed when he thought of it, 
but he rubbed his hands and felt very well satisfied. 

“ There is nothing really crazy about it,” he said to 
himself. “If there is a thing that I think I would 
like, and I can aflTord to have it, and there’s no harm 
in it, why not have it ? ” 

There was nobody there to say any thing against 


144 


MB. TOLMAN. 


this ; so Mr. Tolman rubbed his hands again before 
the fire, and rose to walk up and down his shop, and 
wonder who would be his first customer. 

In the course of twenty minutes a little boy opened 
the door and came in. Mr. Tolman hastened behind 
the counter to receive his commands. The little boy 
wanted two sheets of note-paper and an envelope. 

“ Any particular kind? ” asked Mr. Tolman. 

The boy didn’t know of any particular variety beipg 
desired. He thought the same kind she always got 
would do ; and he looked very hard at Mr. Tolman, 
evidently wondering at the change in the shop-keeper, 
but asking no questions. 

“ You are a regular customer, I suppose,” said Mr. 
Tolman, opening several boxes of paper which he had 
taken down from the shelves. “ I have just begun 
business here, and don’t know what kind of paper you 
have been in the habit of buying. But I suppose this 
will do ; ” and he took out a couple of sheets of the 
best, with an envelope to match. These he carefully 
tied up in a piece of thin brown paper, and gave to the 
boy, who handed him three cents. Mr. Tolman took 
them, smiled, and then having made a rapid calcula- 
tion, he called to tlie boy, who was just opening the 
door, and gave him back one cent. 

“ You have paid me too much,” he said. 

The boy took the cent, looked at Mr. Tolman, and 
then got out of the store as quickly as he could. 

“ Such profits as that are enormous,” said Mr. Tol- 
man ; “ but I suppose the small sales balance them.” 
This Mr. Tolman subsequently found to be the case. 


MB. TOLMAN. 


145 


One or two other customers came in in the course of 
the afternoon, and about dark the people who took out 
books began to arrive. These kept Mr. Tolman very 
busy. He not only had to do a good deal of entering 
and cancelling, but he had to answer a great many 
questions about the change in proprietorship, and the 
probability of his getting in some new books, with 
suggestions as to the quantit}’ and character of these, 
mingled with a few dissatisfied remarks in regard to 
the volumes already on hand. 

Every one seemed sorry that the old lady had gone 
away ; but Mr. Tolman was so pleasant and anxious to 
please, and took such an interest in their selection of 
books, that only one of the subscribers appeared to 
take the change very much to heart. This was a 
young man who was forty- three cents in arrears. He 
was a long time selecting a book, and when at last he 
brought it to Mr. Tolman to be entered, he told him 
in a low voice that he hoped there would be no objec- 
tion to letting his account run on for a little while 
longer. On the first of the month he would settle it, 
and then he hoped to be able to pay cash whenever he 
brought in a book. 

Mr. Tolman looked for his name on the old lady’s 
list, and finding no cross against it, told him that it 
was all right, and that the first of the month would do 
very well. The young man went away perfectly sat- 
isfied with the new librarian. Thus did Mr. Tolman 
begin to build up his popularity. As the evening grew 
on he found himself becoming very hungry ; but he did 
not like to shut up the shop, for every now and then 


146 


MB. TOLMAN. 


some one dropped in, sometimes to ask what time it 
was, and sometimes to make a little purchase, while 
there were still some library patrons coming in at 
intervals. 

However, taking courage during a short rest from 
customers, he put up the shutters, locked the door, 
and hurried off to a hotel, where he partook of a meal 
such as few keepers of little shops ever think of in- 
dulging in. 

The next morning Mr. Tolman got his own break- 
fast. This was delightful. He had seen how cosily 
the old lady had spread her table in the little back 
room, where there was a stove suitable for any cook- 
ing he might wish to indulge in, and he longed for 
such a cosey meal. There were plenty of stock pro- 
visions in the house, which he had purchased with the 
rest of the goods ; and he went out and bought him- 
self a fresh loaf of bread. Then he broiled a piece of 
ham, made some good strong tea, boiled some eggs, 
and had a breakfast on the little round table, which, 
though plain enough, he enjoyed more than any break- 
fast at his club which he could remember. He had 
opened the shop, and sat facing the glass door, hop- 
ing, almost, that there would be some interruption to 
his meal. It would seem so much more proper in that 
sort of business if he had to get up and go attend to 
a customer. 

Before evening of that day Mr. Tolman became con- 
vinced that he would soon be obliged to employ a boy 
or some one to attend to the establishment during his 
absence. After breakfast, a woman recommended by 


MB. TOLMAN. 


147 


the old lady came to make his bed and clean np gener- 
ally, but when she had gone he was left alone with his 
shop. He determined not to allow this responsibility 
to injure his health, and so at one o’clock boldly locked 
the shop door and went out to his lunch. He hoped 
that no one would call during his absence, but when 
he returned he found a little girl with a pitcher stand- 
ing at the door. She came to borrow half a pint of 
milk. 

“Milk!” exclaimed Mr. Tolman, in surprise. 
“Why, my child, I have no milk. I don’t even use 
it in my tea.” 

The little girl looked very much disappointed. “Is 
Mrs. Walker gone away for good? ” said she. 

“Yes,” replied Mr. Tolman. “But I would be 
just as willing to lend you the milk as she would be, if 
I had any. Is there any place near here where you 
can buy milk? ” 

“ Oh, yes,” said the girl ; “ you can get it round in 
the market-house.” 

“ How much would half a pint cost? ” he asked. 

“ Three cents,” replied the girl. 

“Well, then,” said Mr. Tolman, “here are three 
cents. You can go and buy the milk for me, and then 
you can boiTOw it. Will that suit? ” 

The girl thought it would suit very well, and away 
she went. 

Even this little incident pleased Mr. Tolman. It 
was so very novel. When he came back from his 
dinner in the evening, he found two circulating library 
subscribers stamping their feet on the door-step, and 


148 


MR. TOLMAN. 


he afterward heard that several others had called and 
gone away. It would certainly injure the library if he 
suspended business at meal-times. He could easily 
have his choice of a hundred boys if he chose to adver- 
tise for one, but he shrank from having a youngster in 
the place. It would interfere greatly with his cosiness 
and his experiences. He might possibly find a boy 
who went to school, and who would be willing to come 
at noon and in the evening if he were paid enough. 
But it would have to be a very steady and responsible 
boy. He would think it over before taking any steps. 

He thought it over for a day or two, but he did not 
spend his whole time in doing so. When he had no 
customers, he sauntered about in the little parlor over 
the shop, with its odd old furniture, its quaint prints 
on the walls, and its absurd ornaments on the mantel- 
piece. The other little rooms seemed almost as funny 
to him, and he was sorry when the bell on the shop 
door called him down from their contemplation. It 
was pleasant to him to think that he owned all these 
odd things. The ownership of the varied goods in the 
shop also gave him an agreeable feeling, which none 
of his other possessions had ever afforded him. It 
was all so odd and novel. 

He liked much to look over the books in the library. 
Many of them were old novels, the names of which 
were familiar enough to him, but which he had never 
read. He determined to read some of them as soon as 
he felt fixed and settled. 

In looking over the book in which the names and 
accounts of the subscribers were entered, he amused 


MB. TOLMAN. 


149 


himself by wondering what sort of persons they were 
who had out certain books. Who, for instance, wanted 
to read “ The Book of Cats ; ” and who could possibly 
care for “The Mysteries of Udolpho?” But the 
unknown person in regard to whom Mr. Tolman felt 
the greatest curiosity was the subscriber who now had 
in his possession a volume entitled “Dormstock’s 
Logarithms of the Diapason.’’ 

“How on earth,” exclaimed Mr. Tolman, “did 
such a book get into this library ; and where on earth 
did the person spring from who would want to take it 
out? And not only want to take it,” he continued, 
as he examined the entry regarding the volume, “but 
come and have it renewed one, two, three, four — nine 
times ! He has had that book for eighteen weeks ! ” 

Without exactly making up his mind to do so, Mr. 
Tolman deferred taking steps toward getting an assist- 
ant until P. Glascow, the person in question, should 
make an appearance, and it was nearly time for the 
book to be brought in again. 

“ If I get a boy now,” thought Mr. Tolman, “ Glas- 
cow will be sure to come and bring the book while I 
am out.” 

In almost exactly two weeks from the date of the 
last renewal of the book, P. Glascow came in. It 
was the middle of the afternoon, and Mr. Tolman was 
alone. This investigator of musical philosophy was 
a quiet young man of about thirty, wearing a light 
brown cloak, and carrying under one arm a large book. 

P. Glascow was surprised when he heard of the 
change in the proprietorship of the library. Still he 


150 


MB. TOLMAN. 


hoped that there would be no objection to his renewing 
the book which he .had with him, and which he had 
taken out some time ago. 

“Oh, no,” said Mr. Tolman, “none in the world. 
In fact, I don’t suppose there are any other subscribers 
who would want it. I have had the curiosity to look 
to see if it had ever been taken out before, and I find 
it has not.” 

The young man smiled quietly. “No,” said he, 
“ I suppose not. It is not every one who would care 
to study the higher mathematics of music, especially 
when treated as Dormstock treats the subject.” 

“He seems to go into it pretty deeply,” remarked 
Mr. Tolman, who- had taken up the book. “ At least 
I should think so, judging from all these calculations, 
and problems, and squares, and cubes.” 

“Indeed he does,” said Glascow ; “and although 
I have had the book some months, and have more 
reading time at my disposal than most persons, I have 
only reached the fifty-sixth page, and doubt if I shall 
not have to review some of that before I can feel that 
I thoroughly understand it.” 

“And there are three hundred and forty pages in 
all,” said Mr. Tolman, compassionately. 

“Yes,” replied the other; “but I am quite sure 
that the matter will grow easier as I proceed. I have 
found that out from what I have already done.” 

“You say you have a good deal of leisure?” re- 
marked Mr. Tolman. “ Is the musical business dull 
at present? ” 

“Oh, I’m not in the musical business,” said Glas- 


MB. TOLMAN. 


151 


cow. “I have a great love for music, and wish to 
thoroughly understand it ; but my business is quite 
different. I am a night dimggist, and that is the rea- 
son I have so much leisure for reading.** 

“ A night druggist? ** repeated Mr. Tolman, inquir- 

ingly- 

“ Yes, sir,** said the other. “ I am in a large down- 
town drug-store, which is kept open all night, and I go 
on duty after the day-clerks leave.** 

“ And does that give you more leisure? ** asked Mr. 
Tolman. 

“ It seems to,** answered Glascow. “ I sleep until 
about noon, and then I have the rest of the day, until 
seven o*clock, to myself. I think that people who 
work at night can make a more satisfactory use of 
their own time than those who work in the daytime. 
In the summer I can take a trip on the river, or go 
somewhere out of town, every day, if I like.** 

“ Daylight is more available for many things, that is 
true,** said Mr. Tolman. “But is it not dreadfully 
lonely sitting in a drug-store all night? There can*t 
be many people to come to buy medicine at night. I 
thought there was generally a night-bell to drug-stores, 
by which a clerk could be awakened if any body 
wanted any thing.** 

“ It*s not very lonely m our store at night,** said 
Glascow. “ In fact, it*s often more lively then than in 
the daytime. You see, we are right down among the 
newspaper oflSces, and there*s always somebody com- 
ing in for soda-water, or cigars, or something or other. 
The store is a bright warm place for the night editors 


152 


MB. TOLMAN. 


and reporters to meet together and talk and drink hot 
soda, and there’s always a knot of ’em around the 
stove about the time the papers begin to go to press. 
And they’re a lively set, I can tell you, sir. I’ve 
heard some of the best stories I ever heard in my life 
told in our place after three o’clock in the morning.” 

“A strange life!” said Mr. Tolman. “Do you 
know, I never thought that people amused themselves 
in that way. And night after night, I suppose.” 

“ Yes, sir, night after night, Sundays and all.” 

The night druggist now took up his book. 

“ Going home to read? ” asked Mr. Tolman. 

“Well, no,” said the other; “it’s rather cold this 
afternoon to read. I think I’ll take a brisk walk.” 

“Can’t you leave your book until you return?” 
asked Mr. Tolman ; “ that is, if you will come back 
this way. It’s an awkward book to carry about.” 

“ Thank you, I will,” said Glascow. “ I shall come 
back this way.” 

When he had gone, Mr. Tolman took up the book, 
and began to look over it more carefull}" than he had 
done before. But his examination did not last long. 

“ How anybody of common-sense can take any in- 
terest in this stuff is beyond my comprehension,” said 
Mr. Tolman, as he closed the book and put it on a 
little shelf behind the counter. 

When Glascow came back, Mr. Tolman asked him 
to stay and warm himself ; and then, after they had 
talked for a short tune, Mr. Tolman began to feel hun- 
gry. He had his winter appetite, and had lunched 
early. So said he to the night druggist, who had 


MB. TOLMAN. 


153 


opened his “ Dormstock,” ‘‘ How would you like to sit 
here and read a while, while I go and get my dinner? 
I will light the gas, and you can be very comfortable 
here, if you are not in a hurry.” 

P. Glascow was in no hurry at all, and was very 
glad to have some quiet reading by a warm fire ; and 
so Mr. Tolman left him, feeling perfectly confident 
that a man who had been allowed by the old lady to 
renew a book nine times must be perfectly trustworthy. 

When Mr. Tolman returned, the two had some fur- 
ther conversation in the corner by the little stove. 

“ It must be rather annoying,” said the night drug- 
gist, “ not to be able to go out to your meals without 
shutting up your shop. If you like,” said he, rather 
hesitatingly, “I will stop in about this time in the 
afternoon, and stay here while 3^ou go to dinner. I’ll 
be glad to do this until you get an assistant. I can 
easily attend to most people who come in, and others 
can wait.” 

Mr. Tolman jumped at this proposition. It was 
exactly what he wanted. 

So P. Glascow came eveiy afternoon and read 
“ Dormstock ” while Mr. Tolman went to dinner ; and 
before long he came at lunch-time also. It was just 
as convenient as not, he said. He had finished his 
breakfast, and would like to read awhile. Mr. Tolman 
fancied that the night druggist’s lodgings were, per- 
haps, not very well warmed, which idea explained the 
desire to walk rather than read on a cold afternoon. 
Glascow ’s name was entered on the free list, and he 
always took away the “ Dormstock ” at night, because 


154 


MB. TOLMAN. 


he might have a chance of looking into it at the store, 
when custom began to grow slack in the latter part of 
the early morning. 

One afternoon there came into the shop a young 
lady, who brought back two books which she had had 
for more than a month. She made no excuses for 
keeping the books longer than the prescribed time, but 
simply handed them in and paid her fine. Mr. Tol- 
man did not like to take this money, for it was the first 
of the kind he had received ; but the young lady looked 
as if she was well able to afford the luxury of keeping 
books over their time, and business was business. So 
he gravely gave her her change. Then she said she 
would like to take out “Dormstock’s Logarithms of 
the Diapason.” 

Mr. Tolman stared at her. She was a bright, hand- 
some young lady, and looked as if she had very good 
sense. He could not understand it. But he told her 
the book was out. 

“Out!” she said. “Why, it’s always out. It 
seems strange to me that there should be such a de- 
mand for that book. I have been trjdng to get it for 
ever so long.” 

“ It is strange,” said Mr. Tolman; “but it is cer- 
tainly in demand. Did Mrs. Walker ever make you 
any promises about it? ” 

“No,” said she; “but I thought my turn would 
come around some time. And I particularly want the 
book just now.” 

Mr. Tolman felt somewhat troubled. He knew that 
the night druggist ought not to monopolize the volume, 


MR. TOLMAN. 


155 


and yet he did not wish to disoblige one who was so 
useful to him, and who took such an earnest interest in 
the book. And he could not temporize with the young 
lady, and say that he thought the book would soon be 
in. He knew it would not. There were three hun- 
dred and forty pages of it. So he merely remarked 
that he was sorry. 

“ So am I,” said the young lady, “ very sony. It 
so happens that just now I have a peculiar opportunity 
for studying that book, which may not occur again.” 

There was something in Mr. Tolman’s sympathetic 
face which seemed to invite her confidence, and she 
continued. 

“I am a teacher,” she said, ‘‘and on account of 
certain circumstances I have a holiday for a month, 
which I intended to give up almost entirely to the 
study of music, and I particularly wanted “ Dorm- 
stock.” Do you think there is any chance of its early 
return, and will you reserve it for me? ” 

“ Reserve it ! ” said Mr. Tolman. “ Most certainly 
I will.” And then he reflected a second or two. “ If 
you will come here the day after to-morrow, I will be 
able to tell you something definite.” 

She said she would come. 

Mr. Tolman was out a long time at lunch-time the 
next day. He went to all the leading book-stores to 
see if he could buy a copy of Dormstock’s great work. 
But he was unsuccessful. The booksellers told him 
that there was no probability that he could get a copy 
in the country, unless, indeed, he found it in the stock 
of some second-hand dealer. There was no demand 


156 


MB. TOLMAN. 


at all for it, and that if he even sent for it to England, 
where it was published, it was not likely he could get 
it, for it had been long out of print. The next day he 
went to several second-hand stores, but no “ Dorm- 
stock ” could he find. 

When he came back he spoke to Glascow on the 
subject. He was sorry to do so, but thought that 
simple justice compelled him to mention the matter. 
The night druggist was thrown into a perturbed state 
of mind by the information that some one wanted his 
beloved book. 

“A woman!” he exclaimed. “Why, she would 
not understand two pages out of the whole of it. It is 
too bad. I didn’t suppose any one would want this 
book.” 

“ Do not disturb yourself too much,” said Mr. Tol- 
man. “ I am not sure that you ought to give it up.” 

“ I am very glad to hear you say so,” said Glascow. 
“ I have no doubt it is only a passing fancy with her. 
I dare say she would really rather have a good new 
novel;” and then, having heard that the lady was 
expected that afternoon, he went out to walk, with the 
“ Dormstock ” under his arm. 

When the young lady arrived, an hour or so later, 
she was not at all satisfied to take out a new novel, 
and was very sorry indeed not to find the “ Logarithms 
of the Diapason ” waiting for her. Mr. Tolman told 
her that he had tried to buy another copy of the work, 
and for this she expressed herself gratefully. He also 
found himself compelled to say that the book was in 
the possession of a gentleman who had had it for some 


MR. TOLMAN. 


157 


time — all the time it had been out, in fact — and had 
not yet finished it. 

At this the young lady seemed somewhat nettled. 

‘‘Is it not against the rules for any person to keep 
one book out so long? ” she asked. 

“ No,” said Mr. Tolman. “ I have looked into that. 
Our rules are very simple, and merely say that a book 
may be renewed by the payment of a certain sum.” 

“ Then I am never to have it? ” remarked the young 
lady. 

“Oh, I wouldn’t despair about it,” said Mr. Tol- 
man. “ He has not had time to reflect upon the mat- 
ter. He is a reasonable young man, and I believe that 
he will be willing to give up his study of the book for 
a time and let you take it.” 

“No,” said she, “I don’t wish that. If he is 
studying, as you say he is, day and night, I do not 
wish to interrupt him. I should want the book at 
least a month, and that, I suppose, would upset his 
course of study entirely. But I do not think any one 
should begin in a circulating library to study a book 
that will take him a year to finish ; for, from what you 
say, it will take this gentleman at least that time to 
finish Dormstock’s book.” And so she went her way. 

When P. Glascow heard all this in the evening, he 
was very grave. He had evidently been reflecting. 

“ It is not fair,” said he. “I ought not to keep the 
book so long. I now give it up for a while. You may 
let her have it when she comes.” And he put the 
“ Dormstock ” on the counter, and went and sat down 
by the stove. 


[58 


MB. TOLMAN. 


Mr. Tolman was grieved. He knew the night drug- 
gist had done right, but still he was sorry for him. 
“What will you do?” he asked. “Will you stop 
your studies ? ’ ’ 

“Oh, no,” said Glascow, gazing solemnly into the 
stove. “ I will take up some other books on the dia- 
pason which I have, and will so keep my ideas fresh 
on the subject until this lady is done with the book.* 
I do not really believe she will study it very long.” 
And then he added: “If it is all the same to you, I 
will come around here and read, as I have been doing, 
until you shall get a regular assistant.” 

Mr. Tolman would be delighted to have him come, 
he said. He had entirely given up the idea of getting 
an assistant ; but this he did not say. 

It was some time before the lady came back, and 
Mr. Tolman was afraid she was not coming at all. 
But she did come, and asked for Mrs. Burney’s “Eve- 
lina.” She smiled when she named the book, and said 
that she believed she -would have to take a novel after 
all, and she had always wanted to read that one. 

“I wouldn’t take a novel if I were you,” said Mr. 
Tolman ; and he triumphantly took down the ‘ ‘ Dorm- 
stock ” and laid it before her. 

She was evidently much pleased, but when he told 
her of Mr. Glascow’ s gentlemanly conduct in the mat- 
ter, her countenance instantly changed. 

“Not at all,” said she, laying dowm the book; “I 
will not break up his study. I will take the ‘ Evelina,’ 
if you please.” 

And as no persuasion from Mr. Tolman had any 


MR. TOLMAN. 


159 


effect upon her, she went away with Mrs. Burney’s 
novel in her muff. 

“Now, then,” said Mr. Tolman to Glascow, in the 
evening, “you may as well take the book along with 
you. She won’t have it.” 

But Glascow would do nothing of the kind. “ No,” 
he remarked, as he sat looking into the stove ; “ when 
I said I would let her have it, I meant it. She’ll take 
it when she sees that it continues to remain in the 
library.” 

Glascow was mistaken : she did not take it, having 
the idea that he would soon conclude that it would be 
wiser for him to read it than to let it stand idly on the 
shelf. 

“ It would serve them both right,” said Mr. Tolman 
to himself, “if somebody else would come and take 
it.” But there was no one else among his subscribers 
who would even think of such a thing. 

One day, however, the young lady came in and 
asked to look at the book. “ Don’t think that I am 
going to take it out,” she said, noticing Mr. Tolman’s 
look of pleasure as he handed her the volume. “I 
only wish to see what he says on a certain subject 
which I am studying now ; ” and so she sat down by 
the stove, on the chair which Mr. Tolman placed for 
her, and opened “ Dormslock.” 

She sat earnestly poring over the book for half an 
hour or more, and then she looked up and said, “I 
really cannot make out what this part means. Excuse 
my troubling you, but I would be very glad if you 
would explain the latter part of this passage.” 


160 


MR. TOLMAN. 


“Me!” exclaimed Mr. Tolman ; “why, my good 
madam — miss, I mean — I couldn’t explain it to you 
if it were to save my life. But what page is it?” said 
he, looking at his watch. 

“ Page twentj'-four,” answered the young lady. 

“Oh, well, then,” said he, “ if you can wait ten or 
fifteen minutes, the gentleman who has had the book 
will be here, and I think he can explain any thing in 
the first part of the work.” 

The young lady seemed to hesitate whether to wait 
or not ; but as she had a certain curiosity to see what 
sort of a person he was who had been so absorbed in 
the book, she concluded to sit a little longer and look 
into some other parts of the book. 

The night druggist soon came in ; and when Mr. 
Tolman introduced him to the lady, he readily agreed 
to explain the passage to her if he could. So Mr. Tol- 
man got him a chair from the inner room, and he also 
sat down by the stove. 

The explanation was difficult, but it was achieved at 
last; and then the young lady broached the subject 
of leaving the book unused. This was discussed for 
some time, but came to nothing, although Mr. Tolman 
put down his afternoon paper and joined in the argu- 
ment, urging, among other points, that as the matter 
now stood he was deprived by the dead-lock of all 
income from the book. But even this strong argu- 
ment proved of no avail. 

“ Then I’ll tell you what I wish you would do,” said 
Mr. Tolman, as the young lady rose to go : “ come 
here and look at the book whenever you wish to do sc. 


MB. TOLMAN. 


161 


I’d like to make this more of a reading-room anyway. 
It would give me more company.” 

After this the young lady looked into “ Dormstock ” 
when she came in ; and as her holidays had been ex- 
tended by the continued absence of the family in which 
she taught, she had plenty of time for study, and came 
quite frequently. She often met with Glascow in the - 
shop ; and on such occasions they generally consulted 
“ Dormstock,” and sometimes had quite lengthy talks 
on musical matters. One afternoon they came in 
together, having met on their way to the library, and 
entered into a conversation on diapasonic logarithms, 
which continued during the lady’s stay in the shop. 

“The proper thing,” thought Mr. Tolman, “would 
be for these two people to get married. Then they 
could take the book and study it to thejr hearts’ con- 
tent. And they would certainly suit each other, for 
they are both greatly attached to musical mathematics 
and philosophy, and neither of them either plays or 
sings, as they have told me. It would be an admirable 
match.” 

Mr. Tolman thought over this matter a good deal, 
and at last determined to mention it to Glascow. When 
he did so, the young man colored, and expressed the 
opinion that it would be of no use to think of such a 
thing. But it was evident from his manner and subse- 
quent discourse that he had thought of it. 

Mr. Tolman gradually became quite anxious on the 
subject, especially as the night druggist did not seem 
inclined to take any steps in the matter. The weathei 
was now beginning to be warmer, and Mr. Tolman 


162 


MB. TOLMAN. 


reflected that the little house and the little shop were 
probably much more cosey and comfortable in winter 
than in summer. There were higher buildings all about 
the house, and even now he began to feel that the cir- 
culation of air would be quite as agreeable as the circu- 
lation of books. He thought a good deal about his 
airy rooms in the neighboring city. 

‘‘Mr. Glascow,” said he, one afternoon, “I have 
made up my mind to shortly sell out this business.” 

‘ ‘ What ! ’ ’ exclaimed the other. ‘ ‘ Do you mean 
you will give it up and go away — leave the place alto- 
gether? ” 

“Yes,” replied Mr. Tolman, “I shall give up the 
place entirely, and leave the city.V 

The night druggist was shocked. He had spent 
many happy hours in that shop, and his hours there 
were now becoming pleasanter than ever. If Mr. Tol- 
man went away, all this must end. Nothing of the 
kind could be expected of any new proprietor. 

“And considering this,” continued Mr. Tolman, “I 
think it would be well for you to bring your love mat- 
ters to a conclusion while I am here to help you.” 

“My love matters! ” exclaimed Mr. Glascow, with 
a flush. 

“Yes, certainly,” said Mr. Tolman. “ I have eyes, 
and I know all about it. Now let me tell you what I 
think. When a thing is to be done, it ought to be done 
the first time there is a good chance. That’s the way 
I do business. Now you might as well come around 
here to-morrow afternoon, prepared to propose to Miss 
Edwards. She is due to-morrow, for she has been two 


MR. TOLMAN. 


163 


days away. If she don’t come, we’ll postpone the 
matter until the next day. But you should be ready 
to-morrow. I don’t believe you can see her much when 
you don’t meet her here ; for that family is expected 
back very soon, and from what I infer from her ac- 
count of her employers, you won’t care to visit her at 
their house.” 

The night druggist wanted to think about it. 

“There is nothing to think,” said Mr. Tolman. 
“We know all about the lady.” (He spoke truly, 
for he had informed himself about both parties to the 
affair.) “Take my advice, and be here to-morrow 
afternoon — and come rather early.” 

The next morning Mr. Tolman went up to his parlor 
on the second floor, and brought down two blue stuffed 
chairs, the best he had, and put them in the little room 
back of the shop. He also brought down one or two 
knicknacks and put them on the mantel-piece, and he 
dusted and brightened up the room as well as he could. 
He even covered the table with a red cloth from the 
parlor. 

When the young lady arrived, he invited her to walk 
into the back room to look over some new books he 
had just got in. If she had known he proposed to 
give up the business, she would have thought it rather 
strange that he should be buying new books. But she 
knew nothing of his intentions. When she was seated 
at the table whereon the new books were spread, Mr. 
Tolman stepped outside of the shop door to watch for 
Glascow^’s approach. He soon appeared. 

“ Walk right' in,” said Mr. Tolman. “ She’s in the 


164 


MR. TOLMAN. 


back room looking over books. I’ll wait here, and 
keep out customers as far as possible. It’s pleasant, 
and I want a little fresh air. I’ll give you twenty 
minutes.” 

Glascow was pale, but he went in without a word ; 
and Mr. Tolman, with his hands under his coat-tail, 
and his feet rather far apart, established a blockade on 
the door-step. He stood there for some time looking 
at the people outside, and wondering what the people 
inside were doing. The little girl who had borrowed 
the milk of him, and who had never returned it, was 
about to pass the door ; but seeing him standing there, 
she crossed over to the other side of the street. But 
he did not notice her. He was wondering if it was 
time to go in. A boy came up to the door, and wanted 
to know if he kept Easter-eggs. Mr. Tolman was 
happy to say he did not. When he had allowed the 
night druggist a very liberal twenty minutes, he went 
in. As he entered the shop door, giving the bell a 
very decided ring aa he did so, P. Glascow came down 
the two steps that led from the inner room. His face 
showed that it was all right with him. 

A few days after this, Mr. Tolman sold out his stock, 
good-will, and fixtures, together with the furniture and 
lease of the house. And who should he sell out to 
but to Mr. Glascow ! This piece of business was one 
of the happiest points in the whole affair. There was 
no reason why the happy couple should not be married 
very soon, and the young lady was charmed to give up 
her position as teacher and governess in a family, and 
come and take charge of that delightful little store and 


MB. TOLMAN. 


165 


that cunning little house, with almost every thing in it 
that they wanted. 

One thing in the establishment Mr. Tolman refused 
to sell. That was Dormstock’s great work. He made 
the couple a present of the volume, and between two 
of the earlier pages he placed a bank-note, which in 
value was very much more than that of the ordinary 
wedding-gift. 

“And what are you going to do?"’ they asked of 
him, when all these things were settled. And then he 
told them how he was going back to his business in 
the neighboring city, and he told them what it was, 
and how he had come to manage a circulating library. 
They did not think him crazy. People who studied 
the logarithms of the diapason would not be apt to 
think a man crazy for such a little thing as that. 

When Mr. Tolman returned to the establishment of 
Pusey & Co., he found every thing going on very satis- 
factorily. 

“You look ten years younger, sir,” said Mr. Can- 
terfield. “You must have had a very pleasant time. 

I did not think there was enough to interest you in 

for so long a time.” 

“Interest me!” exclaimed Mr. Tolman. “Why, 
objects of interest crowded on me. I never had a 
more enjoj^able holiday in my life.” 

When he went home that evening (and he found 
himself quite willing to go) , he tore up the will he had 
made. He now felt that there was no necessity foi 
proving his sanity. 


ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS. 


ORTY or fifty years ago, when the middle-aged 



-J-' and old people of the present day were children 
or young people, the parent occupied a position in the 
family so entirely different from that in which we find 
him to-day, that the subject of his training was not 
perhaps of sufllcient importance to receive attention 
from those engaged in the promotion of education. 
The training of the child by the parent, both as a 
necessary element in the formation of its character and 
as a preparation for its education in the schools, was 
then considered the only branch of family instruction 
and discipline to which the thought and the assistance 
of workers in social reform should be given. 

But now that there has been such a change, espe- 
cially in the United States, in the constitution of the 
family, when the child has taken into its own hands 
that authority which was once the prerogative of the 
parent, it is time that we should recognize the altered 
condition of things, and give to the children of the 
present day that assistance and counsel in the govern- 
ment and judicious training of their parents which was 


16G 


ON THE TBAINING OF PARENTS. 167 


once so freely offered to the latter when their offspring 
held a subordinate position in the family and house- 
hold. 

Since this radical change in the organization of the 
family a great responsibility has fallen upon the child ; 
it finds itself in a position far more difficult than that 
previously held by the parent. It has upon its hands 
not a young and tender being, with mind unformed 
and disposition capable, in ordinary cases, of being 
easily moulded and directed, but two persons with minds 
and dispositions matured, and often set and hardened, 
whose currents of thought run in such well-worn chan- 
nels, and whose judgments are so biased and preju- 
diced in favor of this or that line of conduct, that the 
labor and annoyance of their proper training is fre- 
quently evaded, and the parents are remanded to the 
position of providers of necessities, without any effort 
on the part of the child to assist them to adapt them- 
selves to their new condition. 

Not only has the child of the present day the obvious 
difficulties of its position to contend with, but it has 
no traditions to fall back upon for counsel and support. 
The condition of family affairs under consideration did 
not exist to any considerable extent before the middle 
of the present century, and there are no available 
records of the government of the parent by the child. 
Neither can it look to other parts of the world for 
examples of successful filial administration. Nowhere 
but in our own country can this state of things be said 
to prevail. It is necessaiy, therefore, that those who 
are able to do so should step forward in aid of the 


168 ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS, 


child as they formerly aided the parent, and see to it, 
as far as possible, that the latter receives the training 
which will enable him properly to perform the duties 
of the novel position which he has been called upon to 
fill. It is an injustice to millions of our citizens that 
the literature of the country contains nothing on this 
subject. 

Whether it be done properly or improperly, the 
training of which we speak generally begins about 
the fifth or sixth year of parentage, although in cases 
where there happens to be but one trainer it often 
begins much earlier ; but in these first years of filial 
rule the discipline is necessarily irregular and spas- 
modic, and it is not until the fourteenth or fifteenth 
year of his parental life that a man is generally enabled 
to understand what is expected of him by his offspring, 
and what line of conduct he must pursue in order to 
meet their views. It is, therefore, to the young people 
who have lived beyond their first decade that the great 
work of parent-training really belongs, and it is to 
them that we should offer our suggestions and advice. 

It should be considered that this revolution in the 
government of the family was not one of force. The 
father and the mother were not hurled from their posi- 
tion and authority by the superior power of the child, 
but these positions have been willingly abdicated by 
the former, and promptly and unhesitatingly accepted 
by the latter. To the child then belongs none of the 
rights of the conqueror. Its subjects have voluntarily 
placed themselves under its rule, and by this act they 
have acquired a right to consideration and kindly sym- 


ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS. 169 


pathy which should never be forgotten by their youth- 
ful preceptors and directors. In his present position 
the parent has not only much to learn, but much to 
unlearn ; and while the child is endeavoring to indicate 
to him the path in which he should walk, it should 
remember that the feet of father or mother are often 
entirely unaccustomed to the peculiar pedestrianism 
now imposed upon them, and that allowance should be 
made for the frequent slips, and trips, and even falls, 
which may happen to them. There is but little doubt 
that severity is too frequently used in the education of 
parents. More is expected of them than should be 
expected of any class of people whose duties and obli- 
gations have never been systematically defined and 
codified. The parent who may be most anxious to 
fulfil the wishes of his offspring, and conduct himself 
in such manner as will meet the entire approval of the 
child, must often grope in the dark. It is therefore 
not only necessary to the peace and tranquillity of the 
family that his duties should be defined as clearly as 
possible, but this assistance is due to him as a mark 
of that filial affection which should not be permitted 
entirely to die out, simply because the parent has vol- 
untarily assumed a position of inferiority and subjec- 
tion. It is obvious, then, that it is the duty of the 
child to find out what it really wants, and then to make 
these wants clear and distinct to the parents. How 
manj^ instances there are of fathers and mothers who 
spend hours, days, and even longer periods, in endeav- 
oring to discover what it is that will satisfy the crav- 
ings of their child, and give them that position in its 


170 OJV THE TRAINING OF PARENTS, 


esteem which they are so desirous to hold. This is 
askiug too much of the parent, and there are few whose 
mental vigor will long hold out when they are subjected, 
not only to the perfoimance of onerous duties, but to 
the anxiety and vexation consequent upon the diflScult 
task of discovering what those duties are. 

Among the most forcible reasons why the rule of 
the child over the parent should be tempered by kind 
consideration, is the high degree of respect and defer- 
ence now paid to the wants and opinions of children. 
In this regard they have absolutely nothing to complain 
of. The parent lives for the benefit of the child. In 
many cases the prosperity and happiness of the latter 
appears to be the sole reason for the existence of the 
former. How necessary is it, then, that persons occu- 
pying the position of parents in the prevalent organ- 
ization of the family should not be left to exhaust 
themselves in undirected efforts, but that the develop- 
ment of their ability and power to properly perform 
the duties of the father and mother of the new era 
should be made the subject of the earnest thought and 
attention of the child. 

It is difficult for those whose youth elapsed before 
the revolution in the family, and who, therefore, never 
enjoyed opportunities of exercising the faculties neces- 
sary in the government of parents, to give suitable 
advice and suggestion to those now engaged in this 
great work ; but the following remarks are offered in 
the belief that they will receive due consideration from 
those to whom they are addressed. 

There can be no doubt that it is of prime importance 


ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS. 171 

in the training of a parent by the child that the matter 
should be taken in hand as early as possible. He or 
she who begins to feel, in the first years of parental 
life, the restrictions of filial control, will be much less 
difficult to manage as time goes on, than one who has 
not been made aware, until he has been a parent for 
perhaps ten or twelve years, that he is expected to 
shape his conduct in accordance with the wishes of his 
offspring. In such cases, habits of self-consideration, 
and even those of obtrusive self-assertion, are easily 
acquired by the parent, and are very difficult to break 
up. The child then encounters obstacles and discour- 
agements which would not have existed had the disci- 
pline been begun when the mind of a parent was in 
a pliant and mouldable condition. Instances have oc- 
curred, when, on account of the intractable nature of 
father or mother, the education intended by the child 
has been entirely abandoned, and the parents allowed 
to take matters into their own hands, and govern the 
family as it used to be done before the new system 
came mto vogue. But it will nearly always be found 
to be the case, in such instances, that the ideas of the 
parent concerning his rights and prerogatives in the 
family have been allowed to grow and take root to an 
extent entirely incompatible with easy removal. 

The neglect of early opportunities of assuming con- 
trol by the child who first enables a married couple to 
call themselves parents, is not only often detrimental 
to its own chances of holding the domestic reins, but 
it also trammels, to a great extent, the action of suc- 
ceeding children. But no youngster, no matter how 


172 ON THE TBAINING OF PABENTS. 


many brothers and sisters may have preceded it, or 
to what extent these may have allowed the parents to 
have their own way, need ever despair of assuming 
the control which the others have allowed to elude their 
grasp. It is not at all uncommon for the youngest 
child of a large family to be able to step to the front, 
and show to the others how a parent may be guided 
and regulated by the exercise of firm will and deter- 
mined action. 

If, as has been asserted, parental training is begun 
early enough, the child will find its task an easy one, 
and little advice will be needed by it, but in the case 
of delayed action there is one point which should be 
kept in mind, and that is that sudden and violent 
measures should, as far as possible, be avoided. In 
times gone by it used to be the custom of many parents, 
when offended by a child, to administer a box to the 
culprit’s ear. An unexpected incident of this kind 
was apt to cause a sudden and tremendous change in 
the mental action of the young person boxed. His 
views of life ; his recollections of the past ; his aspira- 
tions for the future ; his ideas of nature, of art, of the 
pursuit of happiness — were all merged and blended « 
into one overwhelming sensation. For the moment he 
knew nothing on earth but the fact that he had been 
boxed. From this point the comprehension of his 
own status among created things ; his understanding 
of surrounding circumstances, and of cosmic entities 
in general, had to begin anew. Whether he continued 
to be the same boy as before, or diverging one way or 
the other, became a better or a worse one, was a result 


ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS, 173 


not to be predetermined by any known process. Now 
it is not to be supposed that any ordinary child will 
undertake to box the ears of an ordinary parent, for 
the result in such a case might interfere with the whole 
course of training then in progress, but there is a men- 
tal box, quite as sudden in its action, and as astound- 
ing in its effect upon the boxee, as an actual physical 
blow, and it is no uncommon thing for a child to 
administer such a form of correction. But the prac- 
tice is now as dangerous as it used to be, and as un- 
certain of good result, and it is earnestly urged upon 
the youth of the age to abolish it altogether. If a 
parent cannot be turned from the error of his ways by 
any other means than by a shock of this kind, it would 
be better, if the thing be possible, to give him into the 
charge of some children other than his own, and let 
them see what the}" can do with him. 

We do not propose to liken a human parent to an 
animal so unintelligent as a horse ; but there are times 
when a child would find it to his advantage, and to that 
of his progenitor, to treat the latter in the same man- 
ner as a sensible and considerate man treats a nervous 
horse. An animal of this kind, when he sees by the 
roadside an obtrusive object with which he is not ac- 
quainted, is apt to imagine it a direful and ferocious 
creature, such as used to pounce upon his prehistoric 
ancestors ; and to refuse to approach its dangerous 
vicinity. Thereupon the man in charge of the horse, 
if he be a person of the character mentioned above, 
does not whip or spur the frightened animal until he 
rushes madly past the terrifying illusion, but quieting 


174 ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS, 


him by gentle word and action, leads him up to the ob- 
ject, and shows him that it is not a savage beast, eager 
for horseflesh, but an empty barrel, and that the fierce 
eye that he believed to be glaring upon him is nothing 
but the handle of a shovel protruding above the top. 
Then the horse, if there is any good in him, will be 
content to walk by that barrel ; and the next time he 
sees it will be likely to pass it with perhaps but a hasty 
glance or two to see that its nature has not changed ; 
and, in time, he will learn that barrels, and other things 
that he may not have noticed before, are not ravenous, 
and so become a better, because a wiser, horse. We 
know well that there are parents who, plodding along 
as quietly as any son or daughter could desire, will sud- 
denly stop short at the sight of something thoroughly 
understood, and not at all disapproved of by his off- 
spring, but w'hich to him appears as objectionable and 
dangerous as the empty barrel to the high-strung horse. 
Now let not the youngster apply the mental lash, and 
urge that startled and reluctant parent forward. Bet- 
ter far if it take him figuratively by the bridle, and 
make him understand that that which appeared to him 
a vision of mental or physical ruin to a young person, 
or a frightful obstacle in the way of rational progress, 
is nothing but a pleasant form of intellectual recrea- 
tion, which all persons ought to like very much, or to 
which, at least, they should have no objections. How 
many such phantasms will arise before a parent, and 
how necessary is it for a child, if it wish to carry on 
without disturbance its work of training, to get that 
parent into the habit of thinking that these things are 
really nothing but phantasms ! 


ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS. 175 


AVhen it becomes necessary to punish a parent, no 
child should forget the importance of tempering sever- 
ity with mercy. The methods in use in the by-gone 
times when the present condition of things was re- 
versed, were generally of a physical nature, such as 
castigation, partial starvation, and restrictions in the 
pursuit of happiness, but those now inflicted by the 
children, acting upon the mental nature of the parents, 
are so severe and hard to bear that they should be used 
but sparingly. Not only is there danger that by undue 
severity an immediate progenitor may be permanently 
injured, and rendered of little value to himself and 
others, but there is sometimes a re- action, violent and 
sudden, and a family is forced to gaze upon the fear- 
ful spectacle of a parent at bay ! 

The tendency of a great portion of the youth, who 
have taken the governing power into their own hands, 
is to make but little use of it, and to allow their parents 
to go their own way, while they go upon theirs. Such 
neglect, however, cannot but be prejudicial to the 
permanency and force of the child-power. While the 
young person is pursuing a course entirely satisfactory 
to himself, doing what he likes, and leaving undone 
what he does not like, the unnoticed parent may be 
concocting schemes of domestic management entirely 
incompatible with the desires and plans of his offspring, 
and quietly building up obstacles which will be very 
diflScult to overthrow when the latter shall have ob- 
served their existence. Eternal vigilance is not only 
the price of liberty, but it is also the price of suprem- 
acy. To keep one’s self above another it is necessary 


176 ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS. 


to be careful to keep that other down. The practice 
of some fathers and mothers of coming frequently to 
the front, when their presence there is least expected 
or desired, must have been noticed by many children 
who had supposed their parents so thoroughly trained 
that they would not think of such a thing as causing 
trouble and anno3'ance to those above them. A parent 
is human, and cannot be depended upon to preserv^e 
always the same line of action ; and the children who 
are accustomed to see their fathers and mothers per- 
fectly obedient, docile, and inoffensive, must not ex- 
pect that satisfactory conduct to continue if they are 
allowed to discover that a guiding and controlling hand 
is not always upon them. There are parents, of course, 
who never desire to rise, even temporarily, from the 
inferior positions which, at the earliest possible period, 
they have assumed in their families. Such persons are 
perfectly safe ; and when a child perceives by careful 
observation that a parent belongs to this class, it may, 
without fear, relax much of the watchfulness and dis- 
cipline necessary in most families, and content itself 
with merely indicating the path that it is desirable the 
elder person should pursue. Such parents are invalu- 
able boons to an ambitious, energetic, and masterful 
child ; and if there were more of them the anxieties, 
the perplexities, and the difficulties of the child-power 
among us would be greatly ameliorated. 

Even when parents may be considered to be con- 
ducting themselves properly, and to need no increase 
of vigilant control, it is often well for the child to 
enter into their pursuits ; to see what they are doings 


ON THE TRAINING OF PARENTS. 177 


and, if it should seem best, to help them do it. Of 
course, the parents are expected to promote and main- 
tain the material interests of the family ; and as their 
labor, beyond that necessary for present necessities, is 
generally undertaken for the future benefit of the child, 
it is but fau’ that the latter should have something to 
say about this labor. In the majority of cases, how- 
ever, the parent may, in this respect, safely be let 
alone. The more he gives himself up to the amassing 
of a competency, or a fortune, the less will he be likely 
to interfere with the purposes and actions of his chil- 
dren. 

One of the most important results in the training 
under consideration is its influence upon the trainer. 
When a child has reduced its parents to a condition of 
docile obedience, and sees them da}’ by day, and year 
by year, pursuing a path of cheerful subservience, it 
can scarcely fail to appreciate what will be expected 
of it when it shall itself have become a parent. Such 
observation, if accompanied by accordant reflection, 
cannot fail to make easier the rule of the coming 
child ; and, in conclusion, we would say to the children 
of the present day : Train up a parent in the way he 
should go, and when you are old you will know how to 
go that way yourself. 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


I T was a fire-screen, — that is, it was a frame for 
one, — and it was made of ash. My wife had 
worked a very pretty square of silk, with flowers and 
other colored objects upon it ; and when it was finished 
she thought she would use it for a fire-screen, and 
asked me to have a frame made for it. I ordered the 
frame of ash, because the cabinet-maker said that that 
was the fashionable wood at present ; and when it came 
home my wife and I both liked it very much, although 
we could not help thinking that it ought to be painted. 
It was well made, — you could see the construction 
everywhere. One part ran through another part, and 
the ends were fastened with pegs. It was modelled, so 
the cabinet-maker informed me, in the regular Eastlake 
stjde. 

It was a pretty frame, but the wood was of too light 
a color. It stared out at us from the midst of the 
other furniture. Of course it might be stained, and so 
made to harmonize with the rest of our sitting-room ,* 
but what would be the good of having it of ash if i 
were painted over? It might as well be of pine. 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


179 


However, at my wife’s suggestion, I got a couple of 
Eastlake chairs, also ash ; and with these at each side 
of the fire-place, the screen looked much better. The 
chairs were very well made, and would last a long time, 
especially, my wife said, as no one would care to sit 
down in them. They were, certainly, rather stiff and 
uncomfortable, but that was owing to the Eastlake 
pattern ; and as we did not need to use them, this was 
of no importance to us. Our house was furnished very 
comfortably. We made a point of having easy-chairs 
for our visitors as well as ourselves, and in fact, every 
thing about our house was easy, warm and bright. We 
believed that home should be a place of rest ; and we 
bought chairs and sofas and lounges which took you in 
their arms like a mother, and made you forget the toils 
of the world. 

But we really did not enjoy the screen as much as we 
expected we should, and as much as we had enjoyed 
almost every thing that we had before bought for our 
house. Even with the companionship of the chairs, it 
did not seem to fit into the room. And every thing else 
fitted. I think I may honestly say that we were people 
of taste, and that there were few incongruities in our 
house-furnishing. 

But the two chairs and the screen did not look like 
any thing else we had. They made our cosey sitting- 
room uncomfortable. We bore it as long as we could, 
and then we determined to take a bold step. We had 
always been consistent and thorough ; we would be so 
now. So we had all the furniture of the room removed, 
excepting the fire-screen and the two chairs, and re- 


180 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


placed it with articles of the Eastlake style, in ash and 
oak. Of course our bright Wilton carpet did not suit 
these things, and we took it up, and had the floor 
puttied and stained and bought a Turko-Persian carpet 
that was only partly large enough for the room. The 
walls we re-papered, so as to tone them down to the 
general stiffness, and we had the ceiling colored sage- 
green, which would be in admirable keeping, the deco- 
rating man said. 

We didn’t like this room, but we thought we would 
try and learn to like it. The fault was in ourselves 
perhaps. High art in furniture was something we 
ought to understand and ought to like. We would do 
both if we could. 

But we soon saw that one reason why we did not like 
our sitting-room was the great dissimilarity between it 
and the rest of the house. To come from our comfort- 
able bedroom, or our handsome, bright and softly 
furnished parlor, or our cheerful dining-room, into this 
severe and middle-aged sitting-room was too great a 
rise (or fall) for our perceptions. The strain or the 
shock was injurious to us. So we determined to stiike 
another blow in the cause of consistency. We would 
furnish our whole house in the Eastlake style. 

Fortunately, my wife’s brother had recently married, 
and had bought a house about a quarter of a mile from 
our place. He had, so far, purchased but little fur- 
niture, and when we refurnished our sitting-room, he 
took the old furniture at a moderate price, for which 
I was very glad, for I had no place to put it. I call 
it “ old ” furniture to distinguish it from the new ; but 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


181 


in reality, it had not been used veiy long, and was in 
admirable condition. After buying these things from 
ns, Tom — my brother-in-law — seemed to come to a 
stop in his house-furnishing. He and his wife lived 
in one or two rooms of their house, and appeared to 
be in no huriy to get themselves fixed and settled. 
Tom often came over and made remarks about our 
sitting-room, and the curious appearance it presented 
in the midst of a house furnished luxuriously in the 
most modem style ; and this helped us to come to the 
determination to Eastlake our house, thoroughly and 
completely. 

Of course, as most of our new furniture had to be 
made to order, we could make our changes but slowly, 
and so refurnished one room at a time. Whenever a 
load of new furniture was brought to the house Tom 
was on hand to buy the things we had been using. I 
must say that he was very honorable about the price, 
for he always brought a second-hand-fiuniture man 
from the city, and made him value the things, and he 
then paid me according to this valuation. I was fre- 
quently very much surprised at the low estimates placed 
on articles for which I had paid a good deal of money, 
but of course I could not expect more than the regular 
second-hand-market price. He brought a different 
man every time ; and their estimates were all low, in 
about the same proportion, so I could not complain. 
I do not think he used the men well, however, for I 
found out afterward that they thought that he wanted 
to sell the goods to them. 

Tom was a nice fellow, of course, because he was 


182 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


my wife’s brother, but there were some things about 
him I did not like. He annoyed me a good deal by 
coming around to our house, after it was newly fur- 
nished, and making remarks about the things. 

“ I can’t see the sense,” he said, one day, “ in imi- 
tating furniture that was made in the days when people 
didn’t know how to make furniture.” 

“ Didn’t know how ! ” I exclaimed. “ Why, those 
were just the days when they did know how. Look at 
that bedstead ! Did you ever see any thing more solid 
and stanch and thoroughly honest than that ? It will 
last for centuries and always be what you see it now, 
a strong, good, ash bedstead.” 

“That’s the mischief of it,” Tom answered. “It 
will always be what it is now. If there was any chance 
of its improving I’d like it better. I don’t know ex- 
actly what you mean by an honest bedstead, but if it’s 
one that a fellow wouldn’t wish to lie in, perhaps you’re 
right. And what do you want with furniture that will 
last for centuries? You won’t last for centuries, so 
what difference can it make to you? ” 

“ Difference enough,” I answered. “ I want none 
of your flimsy modem furniture. I want well-made 
things, in which the constniction is first-class and evi- 
dent. Look at that chau', for instance ; you can see 
just how it is put together.” 

“Exactly so,” replied Tom, “but what’s the good 
of having one part of a chair run through another part 
and fastened with a peg, so that its construction may 
be evident? If those old fellows in the Middle Ages 
had known how to put chairs together as neatly and 


OUB FIRE-SCREEN. 


183 


strongly as some of our modem furniture, — such as 
mine, for instance, which you know well enough is just 
as strong as any furniture need be, — don’t you sup- 
pose they would have done it ? Of course they would. 
The trouble about the construction of a chair like that is 
that it makes your own construction too evident. When 
I sit in one of them I think I know exactly where my 
joints are put together, especially those in my back.” 

Tom seemed particularly to dislike the tiles that 
were set in many articles of my new furniture. He 
could not see what was the good of inserting crockery 
into bedsteads and writing-desks ; and as to the old 
pictures on the tiles, he utterly despised them. 

“ If the old buffers who made the originals of those 
pictures,” he said, “ had known that free and enlight- 
ened citizens of the nineteenth century were going to 
copy them they’d have learned to draw.” 

However, we didn’t mind this talk very much, and 
we even managed to smile when he made fun and puns 
and said : 

“Well, I suppose people in your station are bound 
to do this thing, as it certainly is stylish.” But there 
was one thing he said that did trouble us. He came 
into the house one morning, and remarked : 

“I don’t want to make you dissatisfied with your 
new furniture, but it seems to me — and to other peo- 
ple, too, for I’ve heard them talking about it — that 
such furniture never can look as it ought to in such a 
house. In old times, when the people didn’t know 
how to make any better furniture than this, they didn’t 
know how to build decent houses either. They had no 


184 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


plate-glass windows, or high ceilings, or hot and cold 
water in every room, or stationary wash-tubs, or any 
of that sort of thing. They had small windows with 
little panes of glass set in lead, and they had low 
rooms with often no ceiling at all, so that you could 
see the consti’uction of the floor overhead, and they 
had all the old inconveniences that we have cast aside. 
If you want your furniture to look like what it makes 
believe to be -you ought to have it in a regular Middle- 
Age house, — Elizabethan or Mary Annean, or what- 
ever they call that sort of architecture. You could 
easily build such a house — something like that incon- 
reuient edifice put up by the English commissioners at 
the Centennial Exhibition ; and if you want to sell this 
house ’ ’ 

“ Which I don’t,” I replied quickly. “If I do any 
thing. I’ll alter this place. I’m not going to build 
another. ’ ’ 

As I said, this speech of Tom’s disturbed us ; and 
after talking about the matter for some days we deter- 
mined to be consistent, and we had our house altered 
so that Tom declared it was a regular Eastlake house 
and no mistake. We had a doleful time while the 
alterations were going on ; and when all was done and 
we had settled down to quiet again, we missed very 
many of the comforts and conveniences to which we 
had been accustomed. But we were getting used to 
missing comfort ; and so we sat and looked out of our 
little square window-panes, and tried to think the land- 
scape as lovely and the sky as spacious and blue as 
when we viewed it through our high and wide French- 
plate windows. 


OUR FIRE-SCREEN. 


185 


But the landscape did not look very weH, for it was 
not the right kind of a landscape. We altered our 
garden and lawn, and made “ pleached alleys ’’ and 
formal garden-rows and other old-time arrangements. 

And so, in time, we had an establishment which was 
consistent, — it all matched the fire-screen, or rather 
the frame for a fire-screen. 

It might now be supposed that Tom would let us 
rest a while. But he did nothing of the kind. 

“ I tell you what it is,” said he. There’s just one 
thing more that you need. You ought to wear clothes 
to suit the house and furniture. If you’d get an East- 
lake coat, with a tile set in the back ” 

This was too much ; I interrupted him. 

That evening I took our fire-screen and I turned it 
around. There was a blank expanse on the back of 
it, and on this I painted, with a brush and some black 
paint, — with which my wife had been painting storks 
on some odd-shaped red clay pottery, — the following 
lines from Dante’s “ Inferno ; ” 

“ Soltaro finichezza poldo viner 
Glabo icce suzza sil 
Valuchicho mazza churi 
Provenza sued — y gli.’^ 

This is intended to mean : 

Why, oh, why have I taken 

And thrown away my comfort on earth. 

And descended into an old-fashioned hell !’* 

But as I do not understand Italian it is not likely that 
any of the words I wrote are correct ; but it makes no 
difference, as so few persons understand the language 


186 


OUE FIRE-SCREEN. 


and I can always tell them what I meant the inscription 
to mean. The “y” and the ‘‘gli” are real Italian 
and I will not attempt to translate them — but they 
look well and give an air of proper construction to the 
whole. I might have written the thing in Old English, 
but that is harder for me than Italian. The transla- 
tion, which is my own, I tried to make, as nearly as 
possible, consistent with Dante’s poem. 

A few days after this I went over to Tom’s house. 
A brighter, cosier house you never saw. I threw 
myself into one of my ex- arm-chairs. I lay back ; I 
stretched out my legs under a table, — I could never 
stretch out my legs under one of my own tables because 
they had heavy Eastlake bars under them, and you had 
to sit up and keep your legs at an Eastlake angle. I 
drew a long sigh of satisfaction. Around me were all 
the pretty, tasteful, unsuitable things that Tom had 
bought from us — at eighty-seven per cent off. Our 
own old spirit of home comfort seemed to be here. I 
sprang from my chair. 

“ Tom,” I cried, “ what will you take for this house, 
this furniture — every thing just as it stands? ” 

Tom named a sum. I closed the bargain. 

We live in Tom’s house now, and two happier people 
are not easily found. Tom wanted me to sell him my 
re-modelled house, but I wouldn’t do it. He would 
alter things. I rent it to him ; and he has to live there, 
for he can get no other house in the neighborhood. 
He is not the cheerful fellow he used to be, but his wife 
comes over to see us very often. 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO 


nV/TR. EDITOR: If the following true experience 
shall prove of any advantage to any of your 
readers, I shall be glad. 

I was going into town the other morning, when my 
wife handed me a little piece of red calico, and asked 
me if I would have time, during the day, to buy her 
two yards and a half of calico like that. I assured 
her that it would be no trouble at all ; and putting 
the piece of calico in my pocket, I took the train for the 
city. 

At lunch-time I stopped in at a large dry-goods 
store to attend to my wife’s commission. I saw a well- 
dressed man walking the floor between the counters, 
where long lines of girls were waiting on much longer 
lines of customers, and asked him where I could see 
some red calico. 

“ This way, sir,” and he led me up the store. “ Miss 
Stone,” said he to a young lady, “ show this gentle- 
man some red calico.” 

“ What shade do you want? ” asked Miss Stone. 

I showed her the little piece of calico that my wif< 

187 


188 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO, 


had given me. She looked at it and handed it back to 
me. Then she took down a great roll of red calico 
and spread it out on the counter. 

“ Why, that isn’t the shade ! ” said I. 

“No, not exactly,” said she; “but it is prettier 
than your sample.” 

“That may be,” said I; “but, you see, 1 want to 
match this piece. There is something already made of 
this kind of calico, which needs to be made larger, or 
mended, or something. I want some calico of the 
same shade.” 

The girl made no answer, but took down another 
roll. 

“ That’s the shade,” said she. 

“Yes,” I replied, “but it’s striped. 

“ Stripes are more worn than any thing else in cali- 
coes,” said she. 

“ Yes ; but this isn’t to be worn. It’s for furniture, 
I think. At any rate, I want perfectly plain stuff, to 
match something already in use.” 

“ Well, I don’t think you can find it perfectly plain, 
unless you get Turkey red.” 

“ What is Turkey red? ” I asked. 

“Turkey red is perfectly plain in calicoes,” she 
answered. 

“ Well, let me see some.” 

“We haven’t any Turkey red calico left,” she said, 
“but we have some very nice plain calicoes in othei 
colors.” 

“I don’t want any other color. I want stuff to 
match this.” 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO. 


189 


“It’s hard to match cheap calico like that,” she 
said, and so 1 left her. 

I next went into a store a few doors farther up 
Broadway. When I entered I approached the “ floor- 
walker,” and handing him my sample, said : 

“ Have you any calico like this? ” 

“ Yes, sir,” said he. “ Third counter to the right.” 

I went to the third counter to the right, and showed 
my sample to the salesman in attendance there. He 
looked at it on both sides. Then he said : 

“ We haven’t any of this.” 

“ That gentleman said you had,” said I. 

“We had it, but we’re out of it now. You’ll get 
that goods at an upholsterer’s.” 

I went across the street to an upholsterer’s. 

“ Have you any stuff like this? ” I asked. 

“No,” said the salesman. “We haven’t. Is it 
for furniture? ” 

“Yes,” I replied. 

“ Then Turkey red is what you want? ” 

“ Is Turkey red just like this? ” I asked. 

“ No,” said he ; “ but it’s much better.” 

“ That makes no difference to me,” I replied. “ I 
want something just like this.” 

“ But they don’t use that for furniture,” he said. 

‘ ‘ I should think people could use any thing they 
wanted for furniture,” I remarked, somewhat sharply. 

“ They can, but they don’t,” he said quite calmly. 
“ They don’t use red like that. They use Turkey red.” 

I said no more, but left. The next place I visited 
was a very large dry-goods store. Of the first sales- 


190 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO. 


man I saw I inquired if they kept red calico like my 
sample. 

“You’ll find that on the second story,” said he. 

I went up-stairs. There I asked a man : 

“ AYhere will I find red calico? ” 

“In the far room to the left. Right over there.” 
And he pointed to a distant comer. 

I walked through the crowds of purchasei-s and 
salespeople, and around the counters and tables filled 
with goods, to the far room to the left. When I got 
there I asked for red calico. 

“The second counter down this side,” said the 
man.” 

I went there and produced my sample. “Calicoes 
down-stairs,” said the man. 

“ They told me they were up here,” I said. 

“ Not these plain goods. You’ll find ’em down- 
stairs at the back of the store, over on that side. 

I went down-stairs to the back of the store. 

“ Where will I find red calico like this? ” I asked. 

“Next counter but one,” said the man addressed, 
walking with me in the direction pointed out. 

“ Dunn, show red calicoes.” 

Mr. Dunn took my sample and looked at it. 

“ We haven’t this shade in that quality of goods,” 
he said. 

“Well, have you it in any quality of goods?” I 
asked. 

“Yes; we’ve got it finer.” And he took down a 
piece of calico, and unrolled a yard or two of it on the 
counter. 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO. 


191 


“ That’s not this shade,” I said. 

“ No,” said he. “The goods is finer and the col- 
or’s better.” 

“ I want it to match this,” I said. 

“ I thought you weren’t particular about the match,” 
said the salesman. “ You said you didn’t care for the 
quality of the goods, and you know you can’t match 
goods without you take into consideration quality and 
color both. If you want that quality of goods in red, 
you ought to get Turkey red.” 

I did not think it necessary to answer this remark, 
but said : 

“ Then you’ve got nothing to match this? ” 

“ No, sir. But perhaps they may have it in the 
upholstery department, in the sixth story.” 

So I got in the elevator and went up to the top of 
the house. 

“Have you any red stuff like this?” I said to a 
young man. 

“ Ked stuff? Upholstery department, — other end 
of this floor.” 

I went to the other end of the floor. 

“ I want some red calico,” I said to a man. 

“ Furniture goods? ” he asked. 

“ Yes,^’ said I. 

“ Fourth counter to the left.” 

I went to the fourth counter to the left, and showed 
my sample to a salesman. He looked at it, and said ; 

“ You’ll get this down on the first floor — calico 
department.” 

I turned on my heel, descended in the elevator, and 


192 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO. 


went out on Broadway. I was thoroughly sick of red 
calico. But I determined to make one more trial. My 
wife had bought her red calico not long before, and 
there must be some to be had somewhere. I ought to 
have asked her where she bought it, but I thought a 
simple little thing like that could be bought anywhere. 

I went into another large dry-goods store. As I 
entered the door a sudden tremor seized me. I could 
not bear to take out that piece of red calico. If I had 
had any other kind of a rag about me — a pen-wiper 
or any thing of the sort — I think I would have asked 
them if they could match that. 

But I stepped up to a young woman and presented 
my sample, with the usual question. 

“ Back room, counter on the left,” she said. 

I went there. 

“ Have you any red calico like this?” I asked of the 
lady behind the counter. 

“No, sir,” she said, “but we have it in Tui’key 
red.” 

Turkey red again ! I surrendered. 

“ All right,” I said, “ give me Turkey red.” 

“ How much, sir? ” she asked. 

“ I don’t know — say five yards.” 

The lady looked at me rather strangely, but meas- 
ured off five yards of Turkey red calico. Then she 
rapped on the counter and called out “ cash ! ” A 
little girl, with yellow hair in two long plaits, came 
slowly up. The lady wrote the number of yards, the 
name of the goods, her own number, the price, the 
amount of the bank-note I handed her, and some other 


A PIECE OF BED CALICO. 


193 


matters, probably the color of my eyes, and the direc- 
tion and velocity of the wind, on a slip of paper. She 
then copied all this in a little book which she kept by 
her. Then she handed the slip of paper, the money, 
and the Turkey red to the yellow-haired girl. This 
young girl copied the slip in a little book she carried, 
and then she went away with the calico, the paper slip, 
and the money.' 

After a very long time, — during which the little 
girl probably took the goods, the money, and the slip 
to some central desk, where the note was received, its 
amount and number entered in a book, change given 
to the girl, a copy of the slip made and entered, girl’s 
entry examined and approved, goods wrapped up, girl 
registered, plaits counted and entered on a slip of 
paper and copied by the girl in her book, girl taken to 
a hydrant and washed, number of towel entered on a 
paper slip and copied by the girl in her book, value of 
my note and amount of change branded somewhere on 
the child, and said process noted on a slip of paper and 
copied in her book, — the girl came to me, bringing 
my change and the package of Turkey red calico. 

I had time for but very little work at the office that 
afternoon, and when I reached home, I handed the 
package of calico to my wife. She unrolled it and 
exclaimed : 

“ Why, this don’t match the piece I gave you ! ” 

“ Match it ! ” I cried. “ Oh, no ! it don’t match it. 
You didn’t want that matched. You were mistaken. 
What you wanted was Turkey red — third counter to 
the left. I mean, Turkey red is what they use.” 


194 


A PIECE OF RED CALICO. 


My wife looked at me in amazement, and then I 
detailed to her my troubles. 

“Well,” said she, “ this Turkey red is a great deal 
prettier than what I had, and you’ve got so much of 
it that I needn’t use the other at all. I wish I had 
thought of Turkey red before.” 

“ I wish from my heart you had,” said I. 


ANDKEW SCOGGIN 


EVERY MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER. 


[Mr. Editor: I find, in looking over the various “ Complete 
Letter-widters,” where so many persons of limited opportu- 
nities find models for their epistolai7 correspondence, that there 
are many contingencies incident to our social and domestic life 
which have not been provided for in any of these books. I 
therefore send you a few models of letters suitable to various 
occasions, which I think may be found useful. I have endeav- 
ored, as nearly as possible, to preseiwe the style and diction in 
use in the ordinaiy “ Letter- writers.” 

Yours, etc., F. R. S.] 


No. 1. 

From a little girl living with an unmarried aunt, to her 
mother, the widow of a Unitarian clergyman, who is 
engaged as matron of an Institution for Deaf Mutes, 
in Wyoming Territory. 

New Brunswick, N.J., Aug. 12th, 1877. 

Revered Parent : As the morning sun rose, this 
clay, upon the sixth anniversary, both of my birth and 
of my introduction to one who, though separated from 
me by vast and apparently limitless expanses of terri- 
tory, is not only my maternal parent but my most 
trustworthy coadjutor in all points of cluty, propriety 
and social responsibility, I take this opportunity of 

195 


196 EVERT MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER. 


assuring you of the tender and sympathetic affection I 
feel for you, and of the earnest solicitude with which 
I ever regard you. I take pleasure in communicating 
the intelligence of my admirable physical condition, and 
hoping that you will continue to preserve the highest 
degree of health compatible with your age and arduous 
duties, I am. 

Your affectionate and dutiful daughter, 

MARIA STANLEY. 

No. 2. 

From a young gentleman., who having injured the mus- 
cles of the back of his neck by striking them while 
swimming., on a pane of glass., shaken from the win- 
dow of a fore-and-aft schooner^ by a severe collision 
with a wagon loaded with stone., which had been upset 
in a creek., in reply to a cousin by marriage who in- 
vites him to invest his savings in a patent machine 
for the disintegration of mutton suet, 

Belleville Hospital, Center Co., O., 
Jan. 12, 1877. 

My Respected Cousin ; The incoherency of your 
request with my condition [here state the condition'] is 
so forcibly impressed upon my sentient faculties [enu- 
merate and define the faculties] that I cannot refrain 
from endeavoring to avoid any hesitancy in making an 
effort to produce the same or a similar impression upon 
your perceptive capabilities. With kindest regards for 
the several members of your household [indicate the 
members] , I am ever. 

Your attached relative, 

MARTESr JORDAN. 


EVEBY MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WBITEB. 197 


No. 3. 

Froyn a superintendent of an iron-foundery ^ to a lady 
who refused his hand in her youths and who has since 
married an inspector of customs in one of the south- 
ern states^ requesting her^ in case of her husband's 
decease^ to give him permission to address her^ with 
a view to a matrimonial alliance. 

Brier Irok Mills, Secauqua, 111., July 7, *77. 

Dear Madam : Although 1 am fully aware of the 
robust condition of your respected husband’s health, 
and of your tender affection for him and your little 
ones, I am impelled by a sense of the propriety of pro- 
viding in time for the casualties and fortuities of the 
future, to ask of you permission, in case of your 
(at present unexpected) widowhood, to renew the ad- 
dresses which were broken off by your marriage to 
your present estimable consort. 

An early answer will oblige, 

Yours respectfully, 

JOHN PICKETT. 


No. 4. 

From a cook-maid in the family of a dealer in silver- 
plated casters^ to the principal of a boarding-school^ 
enclosing the miniature of her suitor. 

1317 East 17th St., N.Y., July 30, *77. 

Venerated Madam : The unintermittent interest you 
have perpetually indicated in the direction of my well- 
being stimulates me to announce my approaching con- 


198 EVERT ^MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER. 


jugal association with a gentleman fully my peer in all 
that regards social position or mental aspiration, and, 
at the same time, to desii’e of you, in case of the abrupt 
dissolution of the connection between myself and my 
present employers, that you will permit me to perform, 
for a suitable remuneration, the lavatory processes 
necessary for the habiliments of your pupils. 

Your respectful well-wisher, 

SUSAN MAGUIEE. 


No. 5. 

From a father to his son at school, in ansioer to a letter 
ashing for an increase of •pocket-money. 

My Dear Joseph ; Your letter asking for an aug- 
mentation of your pecuniary stipend has been received, 
together with a communication from your preceptor, 
relative to your demeanor at the seminary. Permit 
me to say, that should I ever again peruse an epistle 
similar to either of these, you may confidently antici- 
pate, on your return to my domicile, an excoriation of 
the cuticle which will adhere to your memoiy for a 
term of years. 

Your affectionate father, 

HENRY BAILEY. 


No. 6. 

From the author of a treatise on molecular subdivision, 
who has been rejected by the daughter of a cascarilla- 
bark-refiner, whose uncle has recently been paid sixty- 
three dollars for repairing a culveH in Indianapolis, 
to the tailor of a converted Jew on the eastern shor€ 


EVERT MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER. 199 


of Maryland^ who has requested the loan of a hypo- 
dermic syringe. 

West Orange, Jan. 2, 1877. 

Bear Sir: Were it not for unexpected obstacles, 
which have most unfortuitously arisen, to a connec- 
tion which I hoped, at an early date, to announce, but 
which, now, may be considered, by the most sanguine 
observer, as highly improbable, I might have been able 
to obtain a pecuniary loan from a connection of the 
parties with whom I had hoped to be connected, which 
would have enabled me to redeem, from the hands of 
an hypothecater the instrument you desire, but which 
now is as unattainable to you as it is to 

Yours most truly, 

THOMAS FINLEY. 


No. 7. 

From an embassador to Tunis, who has become deaf in 
his left ear, to the widow of a manufacturer of per- 
forated under-clothing, whose second son has never 
been vaccinated. 

Tunis, Africa, Aug. 3, ’77. 

Most Honored Madam : Permit me, I most ear- 
nestly implore of you, from the burning sands of this 
only too far distant foreign clime to call to the notice 
of your reflective and judicial faculties the fact that 
there are actions which may be deferred until too 
recent a period. 

With the earnest assurance of my most distinguished 
regard, I am, most honored and exemplary madam, 
your obedient servant to command, 

L. GRANVILLE TIBBS. 


200 EVERT MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER, 


No. 8. 

From a hog-and-cattle reporter on a morning paper, 
who has just had his hair cut by a barber whose father 
fell off a wire-bridge in the early part of 1867, to a 
gardener, who has written to him that a tortoise-shell 
cat, belonging to the widow of a stage-manager, has 
dwg up a bed of calceolarias, the seed of which had 
been sent him by the cashier of a monkey-wrench 
factory, which had been set on fire by a one-armed 
tramp, whose mother had been a sempstress in the 
family of a Hicksite Quaker. 

New York, Jan. 2, ’77. 

Dear Sir: In an immense metropolis like this, 
where scenes of woe and sorrow meet my pitying 
eye at every glance, and where the li\dng creatures, 
the obsen^ation and consideration of which give me 
the means of maintenance, are, always, if deemed in a 
proper physical condition, destined to an early grave, 
I can only afford a few minutes to condole with you 
on the loss you so feelingly announce. These minutes 
I now have given. 

Very truly yours, 

HENKY DAWSON. 

No. 9. 

From the wife of a farmer, who, having sewed rags 
enough to make a carpet, is in doubt whether to 
sell the rags, and with the money buy a mince-meat 
chopper and two cochin-china hens of an old lady, 
who, having been afflicted with varicose veins, has 
determined to send her nephew, who has been working 
for a pump-maker in the neighboring village, but who 


EVERY MAN HIS OWN LETTER-WRITER, 201 

comes home at night to sleep ^ to a school kept by a 
divinity student whose father has been educated by the 
clergyman who had maoried her father and mother,, 
and to give up her little farm and go to East Dur- 
ham,, N.Y., to live with a cousin of her mother, 
named Amos Murdock, or to have the carpet made 
up by a weaver who had bought oats from her hus- 
band, for a horse which had been lent to him for his 
keep — being a little tender in his fore-feet — by a city 
doctor, but who would still owe two or three dollars 
after the carpet was tvoven, and keep it until her 
daughter, who was married to a dealer m second- 
hand blowing-engines for agitating oil, should come 
to make her a visit, and then put it down in her 
second-story front chamber, with a small piece of 
another rag-carpet, which had been under a bed, and 
was not worn at all, in a recess which it would be a 
pity to cut a new carpet to fit, to an unmarried sister 
who keeps house for an importer of Limoges faience. 

Greenville, July 20, ’77. 

Dear Maria : Now that my winter labors, so un- 
avoidably continued through the vernal season until 
now, are happily concluded, I cannot determine, by 
any mental process with which I am familiar, what 
final disposition of the proceeds of my toil would be 
most conducive to my general well-being. If, there- 
fore, you will bend the energies of your intellect upon 
the solution of this problem, you will confer a most 
highly appreciated favor upon 

Your perplexed sister, 

AMANDA DANIELS. 


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Mr. Stockton has written a hook which you can'' t discuss with- 
out laughing; and that is proof enough of its quality.'^ 

— N. Y. Tribune. 

The Late Mrs. Null. 

By FRANK R. STOCKTON. 


One Volume, 12mo, Cloth, $1,2&, 


“The Late Mrs. Null” is one of those fortunate books that 
goes beyond all 'expectation. Even those readers whose hopes 
have been raised the highest have before them — especially in the 
fact that they receive the story complete and at once, without 
intermediate serial publication — such an enjoyment as they hard- 
ly foresee. 

It is enough to say of the scene that it is chiefly in Virginia, 
to show the possibilities of local character-drawing open to Mr. 
Stockton in addition to his other types ; and to say that every 
character is full of the most ingenious and delicious originality 
is altogether needless. In an increasing scale, the situations are 
still more complicated, ingenious, and enjoyable than the charac- 
ters ; and finally, the plot is absolutely baffling in its clever in- 
tricacy yet apparent simplicity — a true device of Mr. Stockton’s 
tireless fancy. 

“We congratulate the novel reader upon the feast there is in ‘The Late Mrs. 
l^ulU^—Hartybrd Post. 

“We can assure prospective readers that their only regret after finishing the book 
will be that never again can they hope for the pleasure of reading it again for the 
first time .” — The Critic. 

“ Original, bright, and full of the author’s delicate humor .” — New York Journal 
of Commerce, 

" * The Late Mrs. Null ’ is dtlicions,”— 'Boston Journal. 

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS. 

(5r Broadway, New-Yorh, 


di BEAUTIFUL V^EIV EDITION. 



By FRANK R. STOCKTON. 

HjI-USTRATKID by -A.. B. F-roST. 


One vol,, 12mo, - $2,00, 



The new Rudder Grange has not been illustrated in a conventional 
mvf. Mr. Frost has given us a series of interpretations of Mr. 
Stockton’s fancies, which will delight every appreciative reader. — 
dcetches scattered through the text ; larger pictures of 


the many great and memorable events, and everywhere quaint orna- 
ments. It is, on the whole, one of the best 
existing specimens of the complete supple- 
menting of one another by author and 
artist. The book is luxurious in the best 
sense of the word, admirable in typography, 
convenient in size, and bound in a capital cover of Mr. Frost’s design. 



For salt by all booksellers, or sent, post-paid, by the publishers, 

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS, 

^43 ^ 745 Broadway, Nc^Yark, 


A NEW BOOK BY ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. 

THE MERRY MEN. 

And Other Tales and Fables. 

I TOl.) x2mo» clotli) Si.oo ; paper (yellow covers)* 35 cts. 

CONTENTS : 

THE MERRY MEN. OLALLA. 

THRAWN JANET. MARKHEIM. 

WILL O’ THE MILL. THE TREASURE OF PRANCHARD. 

“If there is any writer of the time about whom the critics of England and America 
substantially agree it is Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson. There is something in his work, 
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first page to the last, which shapes itself before the mind’s eye while reading, and 
which refuses to be forgotten long after the book which revealed it has been closed 
and put away. There is a power of a grim sort on every page of this curious story 
(‘The Merry Men’), and with this power a strange insight into the darker workings 
of the human heart, and there is a vividness about everything in it which has no 
parallel anywhere outside of ‘Wuthering Heights.’” 

— Richard Henry Stoddard, in The Mail and Express, 


OTHER BOOKS BY ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. 

STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE 

I vol.*:i2mo, clotli* $1.00 ; paper (yellow covers)* 25 cts. 


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Being the Adventures of David Balfour in the Year 1751. 

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Charles Scribner's Sons' Catalo^yte of their Puhlicationt, and also of their 
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’Tite Poulette. 

’SiEUR George, 

Madame D^licieuse. 

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I vol., I 2mo, paper, - - 60 cents. 

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